‘If you hate your scars, why do you do it?’ he asked.
‘Sometimes,’ she said, ‘the only way to get rid of all the pain in my mind is to feel it on my wrists.’

excerpt from a book i’ll never write #2

They Will Rust, But I Will Be A Flower

The rhythm of
life is dictated by
ticking clocks.
ticktockticktockticktock
But my life was not breathed
to be conducted in the duple meter
of this mechanical march.
I was made from the
undulating ebb and flow of tides, the swaying
of outstretched tree branches,
the rise and fall of the universe’s chest,
the very same cells that bend
to dance with the wind.

My heart cannot beat
in synchronization with wound-up gears.

You’re Still Replaceable

Before you pride yourself on being so hard
for me get over, remember that you broke the heart of a girl
who: falls in love with
sticks and leaves, and keeps her favorites
in the backseat of her car.
cries at crimson sunsets.
tiptoes around insects on the
sidewalk.
feels too much and not enough.
sees beauty in everyone
but herself.
does not understand the concept of loving
halfheartedly.
jumps in puddles and digs
her toes in the mud.
lies in the middle of the street at night
just to feel her heart race.
was never taught how to
put herself first.

You broke the heart of a girl with emotions like
rain drops in a torrent,
an ingenuous heart that still hasn’t learned
that hardening is much safer.
A girl reckless enough to tear open
the stitches, to risk bleeding out
to love you.
You sawed through the tissues
that never had time to congeal.

You’re hard to get over because
I opened my wounds for you, and
every time I pick my scabs, they take
a little longer to heal; they leave
a deeper scar.

‘Sometimes’ she said, ‘I fear the dry days will become weeks and my insides will turn to desert.’

excerpt from a book i’ll never write

I Loved You Like

i loved you like taking
showers in the rain and rolling
in mud. like jumping in
puddles.
like skydiving, cliff jumping, squishing
three people and some swimming noodles
on a moped with one helmet.
like exploring the jungles
in your eyes.
like running through
the forest barefoot.
like cutting the sole of my
foot on a piece of glass, like
continuing to run despite the
bleeding. like the infection
that developed afterwards.
like the scar that remains.

Poetry is being able to see a story in anything.

we are storytellers

So We Meet Again

i saw your face in a tree stump–
large and pale, with exaggerated
sorrow sliding off the
corners of your canoe eyes.
and again on the body of
a girl with your strawberry hair.
i am strengthening myself
in nightmares so that reality
won’t seem so bad.

I Am (Nothing Without) Poetry

I am nothing
besides a collection of poems waiting
to be experienced, waiting
to be written.
I am an urn of emotions, a vessel for verse,
an undulating piece waiting to be
completed.

Losing you is something I was born to do.

it doesn’t make it hurt any less, but i know it had to be this way.

You’re Where They Were All Born

If all my other loves were the twinkling city skylines
of my heart, then you,
my dear, are the capital.

If everything I’ve ever felt before
burned with the intensity of a star,
you, my love, are
a nebula.