messy wisdom

There is nothing quite as cruel as being a teenage girl
too many question marks pass my lips on sentences that do not ask questions
not enough calories pass my hips for days and days and days and 
Amber gangs the girls on me again.
so I listen to my friend with little golden curls and PA roots
I see myself refracted in her cd jewel case,
glimmers of precocious girls with music box hearts 

and like a sage older sister I take her word like gospel
emulating her stained glass life and still breaking mine all the same,
after school, Jesse strums Breathe on my voicemail to impress me 
as I play music videos in my mind's eye against the school bus windows


There is nothing quite as cruel as being a promising young woman
too many question marks pass my lips on sentences that do not ask questions
not enough calories pass my hips for days and days and days and 
Tom gets the nod from the CEO again.
so I listen to my friend with the $1 suit and a rhinestone blazer 
follow the lead of her red-bottom moves,
and hand paint the outsoles of my shoes to match

and like a kindred spirit we live concurrent lives
fifteen prismatic years gone by and she still gets me all the same 
and as I walk home, the faint descant of an old friend rings in my ear
and I will sing along for evermore.

Rugs swept,
slates clean

I kissed the ground you walked on as
you trudged your feet through the mud

The clock strikes ten,
and the steady hands that once sowed our seeds
scatter their ripped roots in another’s garden

He is building shoddy palaces on our ancient burial grounds
while I handwash his dirty laundry

always cool, separate, gentle,
agitate until it’s clear

There are petals on the counter
Light through the window
Food in my belly
But I am not in love,
and what a tragedy that is.

There are petals on the counter
Light through the window
Food in my belly
And now,
There is you.

I wish for you sandy kisses
and laughter roaring with the sea
a little lobster-tinted skin
from the warm grains of time 
and the salt air you were meant to breathe 

I wish for you snowy alpine visions
and chilled cherry-colored noses 
slowly awakened in sparkling scenery
and the crackling warmth of a hearth
radiating the tenderness you were made to know

I wish for you foggy morning walks
and drinking you in like pumpkin chai
a revolutionary book under heavy covers
stirred by the senescence of the leaves and
a million new yous fated to come alive

I wish for you bouquets of blooming tulips
and interlaced fingers in the gentle rain
late nights lit with clicking lightning bugs 
and the early songbird's soft melody 
under the sunrises you were destined to contain

I wish for a lifetime of second seasons, 
and a reflection of you in it all.

His loose grip on the steering wheel,
my freeze-dried eyes stay forward
I have no interest in his tirades on youth soccer
or the changeless red light we’re racing

I catch his glower in my periphery
and amidst my dwindling concentration,
he yanks the wheel to the left and thunders,
don’t make me

He takes a pack of cinnamon gum from the console,
wolfs a few between his scowled lips
razes their wrappers,
then shoots the foil to the backseat

I am overtaken with a familiar pang as
I, too, have been casually chewed and spit out
I, too, have been garroted
by his pearly whites

In solidarity,
I do not take gum for myself
Instead,
I imagine an ice cube enveloped
in my closed fist
The faster the ice melts,
the faster my nails serrate my palm
Thawing until all that’s left
is my soaked skin,
and scars of bite marks past

nibble on my skin until the bone shines
my serpentine silhouette painted on the wall
drag your thumb against my merlot-stained lips
lie on my linen and shed your skin raw

labyrinthine rumination subtly sipped away
escaping the flicker of bitter despair 
our bodies a delirious rhapsody,
the trembling heroism of two souls laid bare

won't you sing with me 'til morning?

I see myself in his margins

we are synonyms
ink for blood
indentations with stains dried
ripped at our perforations 

and in the witching hour
we beg to be poured over,
devoured and deciphered 
broken at the spine

craving the heat of the godlight
while retreating to evade the loupe

I am not sorry for killing myself.

You may think I didn’t deserve this,
and truthfully, you may be right
I didn’t deserve a life of treading water,
so I softly sank to the ocean floor instead

Or maybe I did deserve it.
Did I not earn every bruise?
How do you keep yourself from singing along
to a melody consistently sung for you?

If I am not tainted,
remember me now that I am gone
In every Noah Kahan song
and strong Philly accent
In every eyeroll at an inane joke
and “we should start a podcast”
In every moment when it’s too loud
and entirely too quiet

I snuck away on Halloween,
in the company of monsters concealed in shadows
and skeletons camouflaged among the living
I was once the haunted house,
but now I am just
home.