Snowing in Florida
Table of contents 5 sometimes I write poems to myself... 6 "I'm sorry I slept with your boyfriend on my quest for sexual awakening" 7 I walk to my car with my eyes closed... 8 I am nervous driving home... 9 Oh shit... 10 I used to think that if I smoked enough cigarettes... 11 the tastes left in my mouth... 12 "in your twenties" 13 "Christmas episodes" 14 "every age before 22" 15 "the second poem I wrote about being 22" 16 When I think of holding your hand with both of mine... 17 and just when I think... 19 "how dare you Bret Michaels" 21 "blink 182 was right" 22 "Mental faculties" 24 "Poem about the state of New York" 26 the coldest shower I ever took... 27 I can't play guitar... 28 I left too early for work... 29 the Moon Motel was our claim to fame... 30 my best friend is moving to Maine... 31 "Reading Franny and Zooey" 1
33 in my dreams... 34 brunch is a conspiracy... 35 "Ars poetica for a poetic arse" 36 "I haven’t had a haircut in two years because i have intimacy issues" 37 "A re-writing of the first line in 1984" 38 my 11-hour relationship was too short... 40 "thank you for loving me (how am I doing?)" 41 there are restaurants in Brooklyn... 42 my memory of you... 43 "you have to listen to Cub" 44 we've been in the same room... 45 one of my biggest flaws... 46 Deep in bed before sleep... 47 Thought about googling the fetal position... 48 I made pb & j with a steak knife... 49 "That thing when something good happens to someone but you can’t even will yourself to be happy for them so you feel pure resentment instead" 50 "Kylie Jenner Snapchat Discourse" 51 The woman from whom... 52 I spent the whole weekend trying not to cry... 53 today my mother told me... 54 you don't write yr own obit... 55 the sound of my mother grocery shopping... 56 I felt the change in currents of my stomach... 57 "Free poem for Arabelle at 11 am" 2
58 “Triskaidekaphobia” 59 My heart will go on... 60 "Thinking about Celine Dion again" 61 A daughter with a mental illness... 62 "Summer looks" 63 I melted into a puddle... 64 come to my room every night at 8:35... 65 "A testament to the girls I love most" 67 looking at you is so organic... 68 "fucking you is like shopping at LUSH" 69 "I slept through mother's day and these are the dreams I had" 70 Is my left leg longer than my right leg... 71 While walking to work... 72 "I’m never as heavy as I am while riding an escalator that has been turned off" 73 "Hell-bent on a comeback" 74 "She looks like the Sunday comics" 75 It's funny how we shot each other… 76 One man said to the other… 77 I held a gun in my dream last night… 78 At least it’s Friday, they say… 79 “My shoes are filled with rock salt” 80 “My biological clock runs on batteries”
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My father warned me about men and booze, but he never mentioned a word about women and cocaine. -Tallulah Bankhead
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sometimes I write poems to myself and sometimes I write poems while looking in the mirror these are not the same poems
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I’m sorry I slept with your boyfriend on my quest for sexual awakening I’m not so good at this and if it makes you feel better I don’t remember the last time I cried. I always wanted to find a bra that’d make my chest look that way and once I did I was unimpressed. we had sex in a cold room and it didn’t feel like we were even touching at all. I crossed today’s date off my calendar as another day that I continued to draw a blank. I noticed that tomorrow’s date is the birthday of a girl who spent at least 5 birthdays reminding me how worthless I am. I wonder what your mother would think. I wish I could be arrested for what I did in the parking lots of two different malls today because taking advantage of the privacy of one’s car seems just too easy to be legal I drove through a town that’s full of fields and looks like what my hometown used to look like before it was overrun with mcmansions I looked my parents in the eye and lied to them more than once and every time I’m in my bedroom I feel like I need a shower I need to change the sheets on my bed I need to change the way I interact with people I need a vacation
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I walk to my car with my eyes closed to get a head start on sleep because the sidewalks aren’t crooked and there’s no street harassment problem in this town.
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I am nervous driving home because I don’t know if someone left the porch light on or not I am nervous driving home because I’m afraid that the bend in the road before my exit will make me think of you (and I don’t want to) I am nervous driving home because this isn’t my usual gas station. the total comes to an uneven number and I sit in my car at the pump for a while before I realize that this is the part when I’m supposed to drive away I am nervous driving home because it is night time and I am scared of the dark I am nervous driving home because I am almost home
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Oh shit I forgot to celebrate the ten year anniversary of my first kiss it was in November the first time I kissed someone standing up in the fall too cold because I didn’t wear a jacket and my arms were at my sides and his hands perched on my shoulders and his tongue wiggled like a worm in my mouth and my mom was waiting to pick me up flip phone buzzing in my pocket more than ten years ago I want to drink wine in the winter and beer in the summer outside in the overcast light in a year when the pressure of the humidity is more oppressive than that of my peers I wish I could sit on my bed with my laptop at the end of the day and my bed is a clean bed picture Meg Ryan in You’ve Got Mail I want that I want a neat apartment
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I used to think that if I smoked enough cigarettes it would get me drunk but it just made me want to brush my teeth my sister smoked cigarettes until her teeth turned brown. she also got bronchitis. then she smoked some more. pretty soon the things that are good for you start to hurt you and I can hear the pangs of my sister’s cough with each bristle that pierces my gums and makes me bleed my sisters cough hasn’t changed in years and she hasn’t taken her bracelet off either, her dog collar, her bell, how I know when she’s coming up the stairs and when not to look her in the eyes it’s a great way to lose a perfectly good set of cells or to gain them I knew my mom was losing it when she put shaving cream on her tooth brush in the morning and when the rhythm of her footfalls on the stairs changed I never saw so much blood in a bathroom so consistently everyone is lying to you about smoking cigarettes and brushing your teeth
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The tastes left in my mouth after spending the night with you: bodily fluids that aren’t mine cigarettes that I didn’t smoke and the residue from my 24-hour lipstick that barely lasted on my lips for eight. They sneak up on me at work before I have the chance to brush my teeth sending a heat down my back every time my mind drifts and I put a face to the taste that took up a residence on my tongue.
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In your twenties You learn what it’s like to feel pubic hair against your face and realize that you can’t be the only one finally discovering what it’s like to have a mustache
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Christmas episodes I was thinking about the time when I used to get nervous about heaven and hell and where I might end up, for some reason as a grown adult this came back to me when I decided to sit on the couch instead of help with the dishes I hate remembering that sometimes people move away. What does it take to grow out old roots pull them out and replant them? my heart is beating about things that haven’t happened my chest is hurting over things that aren’t forever there are other things I think about that make the bones in my forearms vibrate my hands are always cold but I never notice until someone tells me Some people still make me burn. The burn in my stomach creeps to my throat. I lay down and it sits there, branding a memory into another part of my body I thought was still healthy
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every age before 22 There are things that make me happy, like movies in bed and Woody Allen wannabes tomato soup and birthday flowers smooth shots of whiskey and pizza flavored beer vacations from therapy and watching Nancy sleep “you have the Coke, I’ll get the pills.” Neurotics and blondes and girls with great minds virgins and cops and men named Felix and laughing alone a few properly placed objects, creating the right impression like a strategically opened book on the coffee table whatever you do, please don’t quote Casablanca and don’t mention the divorce.
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The second poem I wrote about being 22 55 years ago today buddy holly died in a plane crash at age 22 I will be 23 this year but even if I make it the music will still be dead
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When I think of holding your hand with both of mine, bunk beds feel like yesterday. Wood painted white. The highest heights. Rich kids in the city, before I knew what that meant. That’s not what home feels like. Just a vacation before bed.
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and just when I think I’m no longer attracted to or interested in men I notice their arms, the veins in them becoming pronounced when they so much as reach down to tie a shoelace. They take off a sweater to reveal a t-shirt underneath not before it gets caught on the sweater and some skin appears. And on the subject of being into men I’m still confused because I leave his house knowing it was a good idea not to kiss him but I still want to keep talking to him even past the point where he tells me the same stories he told me two weeks before and I don’t stop him because I like the way he tells it and I don’t stop him when he talks for twelve minutes about grammar and words because I’m still listening and I have no reason to tell him to stop. There’s no reason to tell him to stop stop walking away I want us both to be in his room with the volume turned up I only picture him with his eyes closed and I’ve never been in a room with him with the lights off I only tell him to stop when he gets up to 17
flip the switch to the "on" position.
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how dare you Bret Michaels a man made me cry today!!!!! a man with leathery skin and callousy hands. there are people who use the words LOVE and HEART and FEELINGS and SEXY about a man who has mentioned his penis 15 times in the last hour take a drink every time they say the word AROUSED I haven’t seen a girl furrow her brow like that or yell like that since I was in 6th grade I learned what it was like to really sweat and not know what to say and have boys watch while girls tear each other apart with their eyes yaknow I’m really pissed off I’m pissed off that you would mess with my emotions you make me feel like some kind of freak I’m pissed off that you would lie to me I just want to know how you really feel it doesn’t matter what the other girls think I want to know that you’re here for me I’m pissed off I want two girlfriends boys watch and they laugh boys watch and they cheer I watch and I can’t imagine doing anything but try to be her friend do you like Pantera? do you want to talk about Pantera? let’s go to the bathroom and talk about how much we like Pantera take a drink every time they say something mean about breasts girls smile when they’re mad this is real life I’ve never had a girl clap her hands at me while she yelled but this is real life I CAN’T BE FRIENDS WITH GIRLS breaks my heart we’re pinned against each other we pin each other down we put each other down is this a fight? are we fighting? I’m so sad this is real life I’ve slept on a lot of couches in the past year and every time I lay down in a cold place I cry and it’s not because it’s a cold place but because people exchange a moment of intimacy that doesn’t get talked about for six months take a drink every time they say they care about your personality I don’t want to share you I watched this relationship fall apart in six months I watched this relationship fall apart in twelve hours this relationship was based on a lot of things that required decisions there was always a decision to make and who can say what the right one is?? who can say I just had to say good bye to someone could you smile for me anyway could you smile for the camera could you smile while I walk away 19
take a drink every time they make you cry I don’t care what America thinks of me I don’t care what Florida thinks of me I don’t care what you think of me I don’t care what I think of me I don’t care what she thinks of me I don’t care take a drink every time
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blink 182 was right poem for my 23rd birthday I feel small in your bed when I take up too much space a deep breath is accompanied by a shift in sleeping position and on my birthday I do not fit into my shirt I am drinking coffee and I feel older I feel older when I don’t need someone I feel older when I don’t care how my hair looks I feel older when my apathy outweighs my need to shower I pay more attention to the sounds my car is making a deep breath is accompanied by a shift in seating position the room is your bed I’m sitting on the other side and we’re not touching
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Mental faculties I see the shadows of someone’s feet under the door while sitting on the toilet in a Starbucks bathroom that I’ll probably never pee in again. I keep thinking of every little place I visit on this trip in those terms. It’s pretty morbid. Though I’ve certainly had enough “Wow I’m glad I’m alive for this right now” moments to keep me from thinking about death for a while. A sad, strange part of me thinks of my mom when I hear flip-flop footsteps steadily approaching. Katie is walking around the library in stocking feet. Everything is very silly. I remember being 8 and using my own disposable camera for the first time and crying when most of the photos didn’t develop, I didn’t use the flash. It happens again. I never give up taking pictures because I’m a sap. I keep thinking about being an adult and going to the drug store and “how do you get the film out?“ I keep thinking about that. I still get a nervous sharp pain in my chest when I see someone use a camera without its flash. “The pictures won’t come out,” I say. They don’t care that much. Spencer Madsen wrote something about still feeling bad about something you did when you were six and I want the fictional ghosts that I’m so afraid of to suck every bad memory out of my soul while I sleep on a stranger’s floor in the middle of American paradise. I am not scared of the mouse we saw in the kitchen. I am scared of guilt and romanticism and sour retrospection. I’ve never wanted so badly to be a wild oat. I notice a missed call when I pick up my phone to “they are playing Bright Eyes in this Starbucks right now” I send it without allowing response to “why am I a better writer when I’m far from home?” The roads in Florida are white. They almost are in Lancaster, too. What do you regret most about your youth? is a question Buzzfeed asks me when I just want to know which Jimmy Eat World song fits my personality. I am in bed, I do everything in my bed and if I had done it differently I would only have slept in my bed. Bring a bag of candy with me and write down all the poetic things that happen. Five red M+Ms falling out at once and a Reese’s Cup I think will taste better on the second bite. My room is messy. If this were a living room, the couch would be my bed and the TV would be everything else. My room is messy and I feel guilty. 22
A girl I used to love just changed her profile picture and now I can’t sleep. My mom asks if I’m feeling better and I say yes, there’s nothing to feel bad about out here. “There never is,” she says.
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Poem about the state of New York I get emotional about upstate New York it’s true for some reasons like when someone says Rochester or I see Albany on a map the state’s capital the state’s middle finger pointed right at me, the reckless driver not paying attention I drove to New York I drove this far without noticing an old flame It’s too cold I’m going home. Why Albany? I’ve never been there and my trip’s already ruined yet I can drive up there and suddenly put three states between us. Three states between you and I It’s the magic of upstate New York yet I somehow dragged you with me like I dragged my feet through the snow the snow that kept me from going to Ithaca knowing I could never come home. But that’s what happens when you make life decisions when you’re sixteen because you’re not supposed to want to move up there when you’re sixteen I should have known better like when I learned that Rochester is a fucked up place because the only exciting thing to eat there is a calzone. Somewhere in the middle of the state there are these little towns these little towns in the middle of New York manufactured from the imaginations of liberal arts college students where the streets are paved with cigarette ash and everyone listens to the Modern Lovers.
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It’s no Long Island no one goes there to die and I can’t fall asleep on the drive home when I’m the one behind the wheel. We’re not in New York anymore yes we are seven hours from home and covered in your own puke. Forget New York City exists for a minute and take a look at this fucking sailboat of a state. New York. Get a map and look at it right now.
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the coldest shower I ever took was in Bloomington, Indiana the second coldest shower I ever took was only cold because I had no control water from the heavens made us wild that day deep in July you never want a cold shower more than you never want a cold shower to end I want a cold shower right now I want a cold shower for myself five years ago, shock some sense into younger me, wash away the ugly things I used to say. driving someone else's car is kind of like bathing in someone else's shower I have done this before many times but I have no idea what I am doing on the clock delivering pizza casually k turning on the street where I lost my virginity when is a cold shower a treat and when is it a punishment deep in July you cannot tell the difference
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I can’t play guitar and that is frustrating because everyone else can I am an artist! But even I have trouble describing the way the snow melts running down a pole at the traffic light I sit at this time every morning I can make this drive with my eyes closed and it feels like I just did because my head was busy thinking about what boys might think about when they aren’t talking are they as frustrated as I am is it like playing the guitar are they mad that they can’t just spit it out in so many words or that they can’t keep their fingers still in the right spot or do they not think at all
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I left too early for work I have to go to the post office so I turn left instead of right and I pass the house of a guy who no longer lives there, well maybe his parents still do in first grade he told me I had personality in third grade he read the first three harry potter books three times over in fifth grade his friends made him tell me he had a crush on me while a teenage cover band played Jimmy Eat wWorld songs at the class picnic in seventh grade I lost him to a goth phase and in ninth grade I met up with him again when I let him know exactly how I felt about the chin strap he had shaved into his face in tenth grade we had dreams about each other and kept a friendship afloat over AOL instant messenger in eleventh grade he sat next to me in physics class and drew dicks in my notebook every day in twelfth grade I watched him total his car and walk away without a scratch I drove him to school and picked him up every morning at the house on this street which doesn't look as scary in the daytime as it does at night there never used to be a traffic light at this intersection there was only ever one light on the drive to school and it was always red when we got to it
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the Moon Motel was our claim to fame I watched you rearrange the traffic cones on Friendship Road I never saw you again
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My best friend is moving to Maine so my current life crises are comparable to that of the average fourth grader. Some nights when I am too restless to sleep I think of my first kiss I remember that it was on a Monday and for some reason that made me wild. Today I am thinking about being too skinny for my clothes and I am thinking about being six. My last Google search was an antonym for compassion, That’s the new “your picture’s next to it in the dictionary”
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Reading Franny and Zooey pt. I: Franny in the dead of summer everyone’s too bundled up and it’s making me sweat then she took a cigarette from the pack on the table this part makes me think of hate-fucking your TA and this part reminds me that I sound like an idiot calling people “poets” and that I probably hate myself more than I thought then she took a cigarette from the pack on the table paying attention to how open someone’s mouth is and how often they open it is a sign that you may not be talking so much as waiting for your turn to speak then she took a cigarette from the pack on the table chicken sandwich for lunch, ego for dinner wash it down with Martinis and milk someone tell Lane that no one is paying attention to him he left his own sense of well-being in the very glass from which he drank then she took a cigarette from the pack on the table
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pt. II: Zooey I have a thing for Zooey– ever since the very first mention of his knees two dry islands in a very full tub then I’m thinking about his vertebrae his spine and the curve of his back while he sits up in his bath “surpassingly handsome” is a way I’d describe another man in question, also of twenty-five the contours of his face forming canyons between his cheek bones and his jawline I don’t want him to die but I want him to die in my arms he has a tired death around his eyes, sunken in which you’d never think there was any life if not for his brow permanently furrowed but never confused
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in my dreams I visit family and everyone else has a green guitar. which one is mine? I perform. I play on the fly, with no direction. I volunteer to take the place of the star of the show who dropped out last minute. in my dreams I’m afraid of heights, but young kids aren't. young kids bully me! in my dreams I am driven far from where I think I’m supposed to be. in my dreams I run after the one I love. in my dreams, I can't do my job correctly. I run away. in my dreams familiar men in my life climb on top of me in bed. I don't cry. in my dreams I’m not scared of jumping off the high dive, but I am scared of hitting the water. in my dreams I play bass guitar. but I’ve never played bass! I say. to which the drummer replies, who has?
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brunch is a conspiracy but I want orange juice I paid ten dollars for a bag of almonds that’s a conspiracy too
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Ars poetica for a poetic arse Don’t write a poem in the classroom. Write it in the curls of your friend’s hair letting it get caught and tangled in the tape that keeps her eyeglasses together Don’t stop thinking about hair. His hair, her hair the hair on the bathroom tile the hair below the beltWrite about hair. Don’t write a poem in bed. Write it in your cup of tea that you watch with fear, knowing it will burn your tongue on the first sip Don’t stop thinking about tongues. His tongue, her tongue the bumps on your tongue the tastes on your tongueWrite about tongues. Don’t write a poem outside. Write it on the threshold of your front door between the cracks in the wood under your bare feet, giving you splinters Don’t stop thinking about feet. His feet, her feet blisters from walking and too-long toe nails ripping holes through your socksWrite about feet. Don’t write a poem on your computer. Write it in the margins of your class notes while daydreaming about a fictional band called the French Revolution who only sings songs about making outDon’t write about making out. 35
I haven’t had a haircut in two years because I have intimacy issues I went to get a haircut at a Supercuts like a mom on a budget. I was surrounded by men who had made appointments. I hadn’t. They told me to come back in an hour. I thought about how hairdressers always wear blackDid it always look like this? Like a funeral? “Did you check in online?” Has it really been that long? I return and so does a middle aged woman dressed in black with a young girl wielding chicken nuggets. The woman reads my name off a screen. I could smell cigarettes on her fingers when they came close to my face and my first thought was I wonder how the girl feels about that or if it’s something she’s used to by now. We both look at me in the same mirror. Her hand slips and her fingernail lightly scratches the nape of my neck“Sorry!” she says with a giggle to break the silence that I didn’t even notice I heard Hot and Cold by Katy Perry on a radio in the post office earlier that day and now a song I can’t name fills the room. Funny how something becomes more noticeable after it’s had time to become stale playing in the background behind a man in a moustache I don’t recognize postal workers never seem to age and they’re stuck in an unidentifiable time period unbeknownst to the world around them“What happened here?” The woman asks me about the uneven pieces of cold hard evidence that show I have tried to cut my hair myself. “We can use this to frame your face.” “Let these pieces grow out, ok?” I’m being taught how to use my body and that’s ok because I’m open to suggestions. She laughs at the fact that I’ve been putting it off “I know we all get very busy…” She never finishes her sentence. We both look at me in the same mirror. “Come back on the 4th of July” “Excuse me?” “June or July. Don’t wait so long this time” I walk home and look at me in the reflection of everything no one else looks. 36
A re-writing of the first line in 1984 It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. It was a cold day in April, bright, and thirteen clocks were striking. April was a cold day, and the thirteen clocks were bright and striking. It was bright and April, and the day thirteen were clocks striking. Thirteen clocks were bright and striking, and it was a cold day in April. Striking April thirteen, it was the clocks, and a bright cold day. Striking thirteen, the clocks were bright and it was a cold day in April. It was bright and cold, a day in April, and thirteen clocks were striking. April was striking, it was bright and cold, the day clocks were thirteen. The clocks were striking thirteen in April, it was a cold and bright day. April was bright and cold, and the day was striking thirteen clocks. Cold were the clocks striking thirteen, a day in April, it was bright. It was a bright and cold day, the clocks were striking thirteen in April. Bright clocks were striking thirteen in April, and it was a cold day. It was striking thirteen, the clocks, a bright and cold day in April. Thirteen clocks were striking in April, and it was bright, a cold day. A striking cold day in April, the clocks were thirteen and it was bright. The clocks were striking a day in April, thirteen, it was cold and bright. April was cold, and on a bright day, the clocks were striking thirteen. A cold day was April thirteen, it was bright, and clocks were striking. Clocks were striking thirteen in cold April, and it was a bright day.
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my 11-hour relationship was too short to call a date and too long to be considered a one-night stand but on one night stand next to the bed where this relationship took place sat two cups of coffee that burned and caffeinated then grew cold and stale some dates last as long as cups of coffee do and the life of these cups of coffee were never cut short but lingered arrested on the one night stand next to the bed where hints of life stirred and rested and were left lingering never really ending. I’ve never spent a morning with a blonde cup of coffee, full of rich cream color resembling that of black tea when lightened and sweetened whose sweetness remains with the onset of the cold a caffeinated affair interrupted on the one night stand next to the bed would a can of beer instead make any difference, though light sweet coffee and beer two blondes that sometimes have the same effects but I’ve never had a beverage make me cry thirty-two days after drinking it 38
if it only takes twice the length of an affair to be completely removed and thirty-two of those have passed I guess I’m still crying over a cold cup of coffee left on the one night stand.
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Thank you for loving me (how am I doing?) My dad used to tell me to get thicker skin whenever the people I loved hurt me in ways that couldn’t be explained. So that’s what I did. Eating oranges is an old trick I picked up when I stopped smoking cigarettes. It keeps the hands busy and leaves a better smell on my fingers. I started doing other things too-productive things- like writing, doing crafts, even a couple of musical instruments. When I’m too tired or weak for these activities, I pick up an orange. That’s what I did tonight. Have you ever noticed how thick the peel of an orange can be? Do you notice how small an orange really is when it’s ready to be eaten? Does anyone realize how small I am before they try to devour me? I think sometimes when we feel lost, we try to become things that aren’t human. Because maybe then we’ll be less vulnerable, without breakable skin. We try to leave earth without dying first. I learned that if you fuck enough stars you can become the sun. But it’s always safer to be human. Sure, my skin turns on me. I itch. And my teeth grind until they’re dust. My skin breaks every day. So what’s everyone so afraid of? Peeling back deep enough until you’re small enough to be eaten? Or getting lost in space? I keep old wine bottles that I’ve shared with people who, at some point, made me cry when I didn’t think I had any tears left. I may surround myself with empty vessels but I refuse to become one.
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there are restaurants in Brooklyn that I’ve been to once and never have been able to find again that is why I hate Brooklyn and that is why I hate the food service industry since I was sixteen I’ve made my money by giving people things and taking them while they try hard not to make eye contact with me. sometimes couples go to restaurants and sit next to each other on the same side of the booth this is a phenomenon in casual dining that I witness quite regularly and I hate it but when I am in a Mexican restaurant and it is the summer I am wearing shorts and we are sitting at the counter I cannot imagine eating a meal without our knees knocking together and the back of a hand on my thigh and making faces close between meal and check, breathing through our noses because we haven't brushed our teeth yet and we're both self-conscious. I hand two plates to two people who are facing the wall away from me and they are kissing two coworkers close to my age say they wish they grew up in the sixties I’d live anytime it was cheaper to fill my gas tank it is winter and I am driving and trying to follow the subway stops and trying to find the places I’ve been to once and never have been able to find again.
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my memory of you is as fresh as a dream upon waking is your hair still greasy is it greasy when I’m not there does it compromise the litmus paper that your skin is made of testing the waters turning pink at every corner at some parts of the day the color of your skin matches your hair it reminds me of port wine cheese and how I’d like to pair your cheeks with a bottle of red peach fuzzy arms that stay plump all year round remind me that the end of August shouldn’t be a time to dread like going back to school and anticipating the cold weather you’re the little kid bundled up too much for the snow that you can’t walk it’s like how a bad score could ruin an entire movie I thought I’d watch it to remind me of how I felt when I first saw it but the dialogue sounds as contrived as this poem and one more thing you need to know before I finally shut up is that I take kisses on the forehead very seriously
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you have to listen to Cub the other night I met someone who has never heard Cub so I said, well you have listen to Cub but before you listen to Cub you have to listen to Dressy Bessy and before you listen to Dressy Bessy you have to drink a Jones Black Cherry Soda. but before you drink a Jones Black Cherry Soda you have to eat eggs with avocado and before you eat eggs with avocado you have to have dinner outside. but before you have dinner outside you have to get a cavity filled and before you get a cavity filled you have to drive to the dentist. but before you drive to the dentist you have to make plans to visit New Hampshire and before you make plans to visit New Hampshire you have to get dumped on a major holiday. but before you get dumped on a major holiday you have to hit someone with your car and before you hit someone with your car you have to drive into Philly. but before you drive into Philly you have to graduate from college and before you graduate from college you have to get a good night’s sleep. but before you get a good night’s sleep you have to go to bed and before you go to bed, you have to listen to Cub.
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we’ve been in the same room for so long without talking so long that my teeth already feel like they need to be brushed again
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one of my biggest flaws, I’ve learned, is getting too broken up about people who are just plain jerks. what’s even worse is that I cope with this pain by moving on to a new jerk, to help me forget the original jerk. if I repeat these steps enough, the original jerks don’t seem so bad anymore. I can run into them on the street and look them in the eye and say, “hey.” I kill them with kindness because that’s my defense. and I don’t feel a lump in my throat anymore when I look at them, so I feel like I’ve won. then I remember that I’ve let myself get hurt again just so i can allow myself to forgive this person. is anyone really winning here? is anyone really learning a lesson? do I have to continue getting hurt by people in order to move on? am I ever really moving on? when I was younger, on car rides in the rain I watched the windshield wipers. I tried making sense of the back and forth, even though, of course, their purpose was to clear the water from the windshield, but when you’re young everything is delicate and everything has an emotion. I watched the wiper blades, one on the left and one on the right. the one on the right always seemed to be chasing the one on the left, as if it were trying to do its job better, or trying to touch the other blade, longing for a connection on a day with such dreary weather. but they never touch. the left blade falls back towards the right and up towards the left again. “why do you keep trying to touch, you’re never going to touch, just do your job wiper blades,” I thought. I was frustrated because I couldn’t look away, afraid of missing the moment when the left blade would meet the right blade in the middle, completely abandoning their job, blurring the windshield with water and possibly causing a fatal accident. Nevertheless, the weird fantasy in my head would be fulfilled for one second and I could stop watching the monotonous exchange once and for all. sometimes I feel like I’m still watching the wiper blades. sometimes I feel like I’m the right one. sweeping over towards the blade on the left, as if to whisper them a secret, only to be ignored. but they both just keep doing their job, back and forth, ignoring each other on the street, not touching. the thing is, I’m not the right wiper blade. no, I’m not the right one at all. I’m the wrong one. I’m the original jerk. people don’t slide back and forth on a piece of glass when it’s raining, there is no cycle, they go inside and move on with their lives. move on, I tell myself. just do your job. you’re never going to touch.
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Deep in bed before sleep when life slows down enough for me to count the calories I’m burning and the muscles I’m moving I try to see if what they say about smiling is true that is takes more energy to frown Alone and horizontal my cell phone is white hot in my hand and I don’t want to move any muscles to look at it I’m not using any energy I’m still counting my calories
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Thought about googling the fetal position but the mystery is what puts me to sleep In a culture that infantilizes women do you find me attractive right now?
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I made pb &j with a steak knife not out of necessity but rather nostalgia
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That thing when something good happens to someone but you can’t even will yourself to be happy for them so you feel pure resentment instead I saw the Cubs win I saw you smiling in a picture Wondered if you saw me too so I texted yr number hoping it had changed
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Kylie Jenner Snapchat Discourse Hollywood snow doesn’t melt it gets caught on your clothes and in your hair, in a cute way. It doesn’t melt or get slippery yet it is such a nuisance some things are like that when they get out of control, like the micro beads in your face wash and neck pillowswhat kind of plastics did you eat to make your body so soft
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The woman from whom I inherited my mental illness passed away today from a mother to a mother to a daughter she bequeathed to me her sadness after the first part of her died. I overstate— of course she didn’t have a will. She didn’t even have the will to come to the table on Thanksgiving but she did brush my hair once. When did you get to be such an animal, she said. My grandfather was also in a sad place when he died— No, not Florida— The last time I talked to him was on my first day at a new job and I called him on my walk to work because it was his birthday. By the end of the week I got a text message— a text message— informing me of his death and my manager didn’t notice me crying while I closed up and clocked out. I thought about how lonely he was those last few days and how his voice sounded like Winnie the Pooh’s on the phone. He couldn’t wait to see Nanny in heaven. Isn’t that depressing, my cousin said, that’s what he really believed was going to happen. My mom says that everyone’s afterlife is whatever they believe it will be. My sister yells at me at the funeral for sitting in the wrong spot. My father buried both of his parents and the only time I’ve seen him cry was when we put our cat to sleep.
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I spent the whole weekend trying not to cry and I put myself to sleep by practicing the imaginary speech I’ll give to all the people who have hurt me these past couple of months, on the drive to work I imagine they are all on the road with me, putting me down for going the speed limit.
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today my mother told me that she has become too depressed to read and I laughed because I was reading something funny while she was talking to me this was not the most poetic thing that happened to me today I’m sorry if it seems like I disappear some nights I’m here and I’m listening but I am also hiding I asked Kaitlyn how do you wake up before ten am without dying? she said go to sleep baby you’re the best must we chose between soup or salad days or can we have both, like at the olive garden though I’ve only heard of this my mother won’t let me eat there
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you don’t write yr own obit but when yr eulogy is filled with stories from yachts and horseback then u can bet you'll get at least a full page Charlie went home to the lord's house, they said, but it sounds different when they say it in this part of New York an entire mass and not one r was pronounced the last time I marched in a parade down the aisle of a church behind a coffin on wheels the floods behind my glasses made me miss the bag pipes, the men in skirts, the points at which I find inappropriate solace, in a kind of ceremony that I’m guessing the Irish Catholics decided, "wasn't depressing enough" I wonder if people feel this kind of chill in their shoes in the summer, for me this wasn't the first time a new year was accompanied by less than pleasant family news
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the sound of my mother grocery shopping is the sound of my mother on the phone with my father who is at the grocery store and I am in a room in the house as far away from this conversation as possible
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I felt the change in the currents of my stomach like the irregular pulse of a train passing by like a hand on a naked thigh how is it possible for something to be that soft
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Free poem for Arabelle at 11 am Your body is a small room that warms up quickly
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Triskaidekaphobia When 13 happens twice the bad luck cancels out that’s what I learned from you. February and March dragged me and you pulled me an empty effort to help cancel it out
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My heart will go on a pedestal someday, I hope I’ll have as much esteem for myself as I seem to have for everyone else
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Thinking about Celine Dion again My heart will go on top when it’s ready My heart will go on reality television to discuss its sex addiction My heart will go on stage to accept its award My heart will go on pain medication after getting its teeth pulled My heart will go on to become a successful playwright My heart will go on maternity leave My heart will go on sabbatical My heart will go on the waiting list for a transplant My heart will go on a feminist tirade if you say that again My heart will go on Facebook to connect with old friends My heart will go on the Late Show with David Letterman My heart will go on a witch hunt My heart will go on believing that u were the one My heart will go on a date My heart will go on a cruise My heart will go on a midnight train to Georgia My heart will go on vacation to the Bahamas My heart will go on the ten items or less line at the supermarket My heart will go on time My heart will go on the shelf when I’m done with it
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A daughter with a mental illness that affects her physically, a mother with a physical illness that affects her mentally, and a father who doesn’t know how to cook.
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Summer looks I’ve got a body like a bean That can’t sit up right on its own This city’s new buildings have reflective windows for walls So I learned this on my walk to work You never walk towards a mirror sideways Just like kidneys are always facing each other Just like your friend’s swimming pool on the nicer side of town A bean floating in water takes a new shape
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I melted into a puddle on Nichol Avenue and I can't believe between me and the rain the chalk on the sidewalk has not been washed away I used to miss my exit now I miss my bus stop they skipped spring this year so I’m forging one forcing the rain it's too early to be this humid this is the year I melt into a human puddle in the middle of the sidewalk on the way home
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come to my room every night at 8:35 and see how the sky shines a shade of pink onto the corner of my bed before it turns blue/black. maybe stay for a while, wait as long as possible before switching a lamp on. glows from the porch light, street light, and passing headlights help us save energy in the dark. take bets on how long the leaves on the trees will match the colors of the house behind it. everyone seems to have a driveway but us.
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A testament to the girls I love most "I get rejected every day, Abigail, by all the strangers I fall in love with on a daily basis.” This nugget of wisdom went unnoticed by you, unfortunately as the topic quickly turned to birds. You’re always talking about birds. And I suppose that’s the reason you’re one of the three people I’m thinking about at 5 am, the end of a night and beginning of a day when I find myself trying to separate the birds calls from the bird songs. I wonder if they’re trying to tell me something. (This is the part where Abigail stops listening.) I’m thinking about how we’re sleeping head-to-toe and even though we’re friends and I’ve slept in this bed many times it was only yesterday we found the head-to-toe method as the best for sleeping comfortably but now what’s keeping me from kissing the skin of the legs laying next to me, extending from a creature who never ceases to amaze me. I knew I’d regret not writing these words down and even before I wrote them I thought up an excuse: It was 5 am, I was tired. Hormonal. Emotional. Lonely. Our periods synced up. That’s 65
not helping anyone’s case. It’s taking everything in me not to fall asleep in my notebook right now but I could never let you find me, the culprit at the scene of the crime, writing in purple pen no less— but you are not just a girl who is characterized by the color purple some people may think that, but I don’t. Now I’m thinking about hair, not just your hair but her hair, how when it’s unwashed and greasy I notice and that I’ve never been so enamored by someone who hasn’t showered. And even if I don’t get any sleep tonight I still have the fuzzy image in my head of her wiggling her fingers from ten feet away, a silent but cheerful goodbye that I only hope is joined by a looming hello.
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looking at you is so organic. there are wells dug deep into your eyes and if you’d let someone drown in them it would be the most generous gift you could ever give. you teach me something new without opening up your mouth and I think the earth moved when you blinked you are the spring time. you are the bugs that come out of the ground at night and sing me to sleep when I’m homesick. the kind of beautiful seen with eyes closed. I want to plant a seed into the wrinkle in your brow because I can’t stand to think of the potential of your soil going to waste. dirt and leaves and stems will fall down your face to your chin and you will pout— forming canyons that put the entire state of Arizona to shame. everything I know about geography I learned from looking at you and everything i know about nature I’ve forgotten science doesn’t exist. children lay on their backs in the grass at night and argue about what your eyes are made of. your nose breaks every rule of physics. you closed your eyes and planets fell out of line. galaxies don’t exist. I try to keep my balance on this rock that you spin upon the tip of your finger. there is no world, there is only you you are the earth. you hold the water and nothing holds you.
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fucking you is like shopping at LUSH fucking you is like shopping at LUSH because I always spend more time here than I’d like to. "Let me show you something," that’s how it starts. fucking you is like shopping LUSH because even though there are ones closer to my house you’ve somehow convinced me that traveling the extra distance is worth it for what’s seemingly “bigger and better.” fucking you is like shopping at LUSH because I hate the way my hands are being touched by such ingenuine hands hands with motives, hands with an agenda. fucking you is like shopping at LUSH because I am thinking of my girlfriend the whole time. I think of my girlfriend and I think "Yeah, she would like this." fucking you is like shopping at LUSH because suddenly my hair feels both clean and dirty at the same time. fucking you is like shopping at LUSH because I got a hot cinnamon pretzel afterwards. what? I got hungry. fucking you is like shopping at LUSH because even when I get home I see your face among my things. I see your face and it’s saying "Yep, I’m responsible for this. And you’re going to come back for more."
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I slept through Mother’s day and these are the dreams I had I made dinner in a Sears model kitchen bean casserole in a round pan I broke a wooden spoon so they made me buy it I slept through mother’s day and these are the dreams I had one day I will speak to my mother through a medium I will be gray but not the kind of gray people get when they’re old but more like the way fruit fades when it sits in a pitcher of sangria for too long I will get married in my favorite castle because my mother says so even though I don’t think I’ll ever get married or know enough castles to have a favorite one and after this so-called wedding everyone will come over and watch us cut the cake in our Sears model kitchen someone bought us a new wooden spoon I am dreaming the entire time
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Is my left leg longer than my right leg? I thought as I walked into my first therapy appointment in three weeks What if my bangs were brushed to the other side? Would people notice? Would that be weird? Would people recognize me? If I get stabbed tonight on the walk home, what will spill out? Like a cat’s scratch on a brown leather couch, will it look like spilled milk? Will I cry?
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While walking to work after giving myself upwards of 8 minutes to get ready, I habitually look to my left at the reflections in the windows of parked cars. The passenger’s side of a minivan is smashed, undiscovered by its owner. Insurance policy for them, seven years of bad luck for me. “Now I’m Perfect” reads matching Frozen franchise backpacks worn by two girls walking to preschool, connected by a protective chain of hand-holding. I pass them with my ruthless gait. When I’m late it’s like a surprise session of exercise. Crossing an intersection on a green light, and I don’t have to go running later. In eyeshot there stand the futures of people I tangentially know, wearing Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital nametags. What is the opposite of a ghost? I’m always wearing a backpack. If I stay in New Brunswick, maybe one day I will be perfect.
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I’m never as heavy as I am while riding an escalator that has been turned off I will stop drinking soda and start running as soon as my body stops feeling like it weighs five tons I think about resilience or maybe it’s pride I walk thru a cross walk while two cars coming from two different directions stare at me impatiently with their turn signals blinking hit me, I think I weigh more than both of you combined
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Hell-bent on a comeback I’m the east coast Cher Horowitz Telling the guy on the street to fuck off Take a picture it’ll last longer (haven’t said this one out loud yet) I’m telling the guy in line at the cafe to fuck off I’m telling the stranger outside on my break to fuck off I’m telling the person on my porch to fuck off I’m telling my boss to fuck off I’m telling my sister to fuck off (already did this) I’m telling the uninvited guest to fuck off I’m telling my old roommates to fuck off I’m telling a bunch of people on the Internet to fuck off I’m telling my landlord to fuck off I’m telling the actors on TV to fuck off I’m telling my former self to fuck off I’m telling the magazine editors to fuck off I’m telling some dudes on a balcony to fuck off I’m telling my two ex-boyfriends to fuck off I’m telling dead celebrities to fuck off I’m telling the woman who asked where the bathroom is to fuck off I’m telling you thru a text message to fuck off I’m telling Mark Zuckerberg to fuck off I’m telling my twelfth grade English teacher to fuck off I’m telling my friend’s mom to fuck off I’m telling the person who stole colossus by Sylvia Plath from the bookstore to fuck off I’m telling Tumblr poets to fuck off I’m telling the girl who brought her dog to the party to fuck off I’m telling my therapist to fuck off I’m telling the bus driver to fuck off I’m telling people in a dingy basement to fuck off I’m telling the guy interrupting my meal in public to fuck off I’m telling you thru a microphone to fuck off I’m telling an audience watching me read poetry to fuck off I’m telling my acquaintances to fuck off I’m telling the guy who almost hit me with his car to fuck off I’m telling Taco Bell breakfast to fuck off I’m telling the person who just introduced themselves to me to fuck off I’m telling anyone waiting for their name to fuck off This is your cue. 73
She looks like the Sunday comics Heart of Glass was playing at Lane Kim’s wedding and soon I wanted to be Debbie Harry (even during that episode the Gilmores made it all about them) ((I don’t believe for a second that Lane wanted to see American Gigolo for her bachelorette party)) I woke up at 2:30pm and Vinny shaved off his beard in the backyard. Another day spent being too tired (read: lazy) ((read: depressed)) to eat anything besides cereal, and coffee that was made for me. Read an entire Lynda Barry book Vinny was assigned for class (her comics are sad but funny, Katie sings) I wear headphones because I don’t want to be background noise. Sitting on the couch there’s finally a cool breeze coming in from the window. But I’m sweating and shaking and it’s 7pm and it’s already dark out. I’m sweating and shaking and getting really into Blondie.
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It’s funny how we shot each other because we thought we were ghosts but we were ok we weren’t even wearing bulletproof vests Meghan once wrote “I can’t wait to know you in the winter” I didn’t want to steal her line And I’m pulling this from another poem I won’t write about snow because we live in the desert now Don’t believe me? Look at the cactus on my windowsill It keeps intruders out
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One man said to the other, “I hope it’s a mild winter” and then they started arguing I almost long for the sound of shovels scraping against the pavement waking me up on an obligation-free day because nature blocks the roads The world ends every time it snows and we have more water than we know what to do with
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I held a gun in my dream last night Is the safety off? I said Of course it is, doofus he said We were in a hurry. It was only an act I never shot the gun. Roller coasters and bridges and train tracks fused together in architectural amalgamation as if the engineers switched jobs halfway thru there was always so much certainty in roller coasters that lacked in bridges. Suddenly a bridge with no end becomes an ideabridges that break and fall periodically. Roller coasters have a beginning and they have an end. The destination is fixed. You know when you’ll arrive. Chances are, it’s right next to where you departed. Your rites of passage always come with risks. Sometimes you get three chances. Sometimes you die. When a roller coaster or bridge or set of train tracks is abandoned, things grow. Cob webs form like long hammocks lining the path under a bridge to shore. I swing from these hammocks. I jump from each of them like a gymnast on uneven bars, getting closer and closer to a world stuck in sepia. Pool parties at night, getting lost in department storesIt’s always summer and I always have to take a family portrait on the jetty.
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At least it’s Friday, they say whatever that means I can’t see any snow from where I’m standing but there’s crack in the sidewalk students are blocking traffic and my mother’s not doing too well. At least it’s Saturday, they never say of course, I can’t hear them I only answer to my alarm and the fluids that demand to leave my body
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My shoes are filled with rock salt And when the snow is the right amount of dirty, it looks like crumb cake dusted with powdered sugar. Where do you draw the line between looking for a solution and just wanting to complain? He sat next to me and I wondered what I had done right. He walked away and I wondered what I had done wrong. I watched Blue Crush and it didn’t cure my depression. I will want to take a bath and my feet are already at the spa. My shoes are filled with rock salt embalming a little bit of winter because maybe one day I’ll live in Hawaii and be sad there instead
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My biological clock runs on batteries I apologized so much in my adolescent existence and now I can't get those breaths back In 10th grade our class read the Awakening but I didn't which was probably for the best because I hear it ends in suicide I drove to Aldi behind a van that had a bumper sticker "Honk if parts fall off" and I thought, “same� The source of my auxiliary power is locked in a closet in a city I haven't visited yet. I don't die when the batteries run out. What most people don't know is that I've been running on fumes for years. I want to find the person who called me a "dykey little whore" when I was twelve and show them that I can finally live up to the title. I let someone I wanted to fuck give me a tattoo I thought it would fade by now but like tattoos, some things don't come with exceptions I peel off my nail polish like one would scrape grease off a frying pan It's satisfying yet grotesque I'm not supposed to save this, right? There are healthier options. Flecks of skin on my nails escape Leaving them like paint-chipped walls, Damaged, Reparable cosmetology. I sit in the sun on April 25th It is hot I wear jeans I have trust issues with the weather It is in my biological makeup to protect myself If there is no defense, there is no offense. If there is no escape plan, there is no plan. 80
Black flecks of chipped polish stick to my sweaty fingers and I question my qualification for growing older. I bring hot tea with me out on the porch on April 25th under the warm sun A tall mug, honey and the mother A weapon, I think Just in case. A bee keeps me company. There are no plants on the porch I'm too flaky to garden. Did I tell you what happened to my cactus? I disappoint the bee. There's something I'm supposed to be doing for this bee, and I can't remember what it is. In grade school a man talked to our class about bees. He was enthusiastic and made us chant new words like POLLINATION In high school we had assemblies on how not to die after prom. The energy I use on thoughts and personal tasks is compounded with the questioning of what everyone around thinks Sitting on my porch on April 25th, cross-legged and barefoot I chip away at my nail polish Looking up periodically Like sending a text message in class Defensively As if to say I know what this looks like but I'm pondering the unanswered questions of the universe, I swear!!! No one is walking by. I'm not in school anymore. Cars are honking at the distracted when the light on the corner turns green. People are driving with the windows down, singing along with the blasting radio unapologetically. Maybe if my house was on wheels I’d be happier. People would still honk at me when the light turns green I'm too busy picking at my nail polish.
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