pere

do you want some ice cream?

vanilla?

perhaps moose tracks?

i look at the man who hurt me 

made me feel like i wasn't enough 

who i hold in my bones 

like a trauma i can't shake 

he has the power

to soften me 

to disintegrate me 

to melt me 

to shape who i love 

who loves me 

he's planted seeds for what i am to become 

i can't leave 

and i can't stay 

where do i go?

what do i do?

i am my father 

i am my father's father 

i hold their stories

and their pieces

in my soft parts

in my hard parts 

and i wonder

how many ways can he break me

before i'm cut loose

and never look back

reflections

my whole life i've been looking for myself in the gaze of someone else. i wonder what would happen if i shaved my head or if i walked into the woods and never turned around. 

when i was a little girl, you told me vampires couldn't see their own reflection. everyday, i run my tongue over the sharp points of my teeth, burning to forget the taste of strangers' wrists. 

...

too often do we focus on what we don't have, our faults, our deficiencies. that's a trite observation, but why is the grass always greener? the sky could always be bluer. should I be thinking about my life in a linear or a cyclical way? will choosing one make living easier? am i doing this right? is it okay that i look like this? speak like this?

i wish i could talk to you without my brain short-circuiting. i wish i could show you who i am.

i wish i didn't have the thoughts of an anti-social insecure high school girl with bacne as an almost 25 year old. i wish i was more. 

i wish the internet didn't distract me from my thoughts. i wish i could develop an idea—i have a lot of interesting takes. 

fin, i wish i didn't want to crawl out of my skin and inhabit some amorphous space between us. i wish i didn't want to watch you live your life, but rather be there next to you living mine. 

fill in the blank

are you surpised?

that im still here 

writing 

breathing 

that i didn't kill myself 

when things were hard

that my grip is still strong 

when i saw no light 

but when i couldn't sleep

and i couldn't write

—i'd think of you 

i learned to convert you to 

edges and curves 

losing myself in translation

where i was the savior 

no dots, no ends 

you wouldn't get it

it didn't hurt you 

so i weep 

and rewrite 

— and carry the burden

hold our lies 

you sit back 

and watch with disgust

as our reshapings 

collapse my back 

and shatter my spine

to b

c, i don't know what happened

i may have said something 

shown you too much

but i saw you dance with her 

if i drove up to your apartment  

would you kiss me

would you love me 

would you tell me to leave 

go straight to hell 

what if i asked you to hug me 

to see me 

would you push me 

ignore me

snicker?

or would it be just like i dreamed it

would you pick me up 

clean my wounds 

replace my stolen wings?

you've always been mine to lose 

shortfalls

your whisper was the last thing i heard 

before the tone consumed my world

now i wait for you to come back 

i see you sometimes 

in your wool sweater 

you wave from the window 

the sun always hangs behind 

but you don't come in 

you were never mine

sometimes you ride your skateboard 

and i can't breathe 

you figured it out — i wasn't 

i know you are hers'

you'll meet on the internet 

and be happy

she'll see and hear 

what i missed

at sixes and sevens

you have my heart

you don't know it

so i weep 

and pace the wooden floors 

pick at my scabs until they bleed 

sink my fingers into my bruises

weren't you suppose to know 

wasn't this all suppose to be beautiful 

weren't the small moments supposed to be fuller 

now i will die before i tell the truth 

i can't unwrite my fate

i'll dissolve without the guiding hands of someone who knows better 

it's all so untidy 

command z

i'd cut myself open for you

pull out my insides 

rewire my brain 

unwrite my stories 

i'd break my collarbone 

so your head would rest more comfortably 

i'd sand down my calluses 

so your fingers wouldn't catch 

as you trace my palm lines 

i'd erase my scars 

so you could kiss me 

without being reminded of my cracks

i'd rewrite my birth chart 

to make it match yours 

but that wouldn't be enough, right?

you wouldn't want me if i was faultless

you wouldn't want me in the rain 

you wouldn't want me in the fall 

you wouldn't want me by the beach 

you wouldn't want me if no one else was around 

would you?

sorry

i am sorry for looking at you 

i am sorry for being sad when you wanted to enjoy your day 

i am sorry for saying things that you don't know how to respond to 

i am sorry, i am sorry, i am sorry 

for the mess 

for your time 

for making you repeat yourself 

for thinking i could be yours 

you'll sit in my head 

like tropical heat 

you've crumbled my walls 

thickened my air 

closed my throat 

where did you get this control 

oh wait, i gave it to you 

i gave you me

and now im left

without a body

with a disconnected mind 

to drift 

and let the wind decide 

for c—

can we go back to that bright place?

to the ripe august nights 

where we were 'happy' 

remember when you liked my insecurity?

aw, you thought you could help me 

you thought i was an unturned gem 

can we go back?

to right before i lied to you?

before i set eyes on you?

didn't the future seem golden 

you promised good morning sleepy kisses

and to hold me through consciousness 

but, maybe you didn't

i no longer know reality 

except the one i shaped for you 

prison

I have been at war with my body for 14 years--perhaps longer. In an effort to reclaim my body and assert my territory, I have lost myself. My desire to reshape has been solely motivated by a deep hatred of my being that courses through my body. I am not enough. Yet, I am too much. I take up too much space. My stomach is too big. My cheeks are too round. I am too soft--a softness that I cannot be, but I have to. Maybe I am too weak. Maybe I wasn't meant to thrive. Maybe I will die trapped in this paradox. Why did I build this body? 

I assert myself with each bite, with every inaction, every time I choose not to work out. Yet, my thoughts and feelings are already written for me. The pain is laid out. My subconscious rears her head. She is trapped. 

My body is a mistake. Do I want to be positive about it? Do I want to try to convince myself that this challenge ultimately brings meaning to my life? Should I explore fate or destiny? Or do I want to wallow? Will wallowing help me? Or will it inevitably bring me cynicism and to the conclusion that nothing matters so why should I care? 

I don't feel connected to this form. Each bite weighs me, answers to gravity, brings me closer to the Earth. Maybe that's some bullshit, but maybe I should drink the Kool-Aid. Maybe I'm meant to be tethered, maybe a heavy, big body is the only connection I will have in this life. Am I the enemy? Is my body the contagion?

Rejecting capitalist consumption and bodily values doesn't bring me any peace. It doesn't make me feel seen. In fact, it makes me feel more excluded--like I have to forge my own path in order to feel any semblance of belonging. Completely reliant on the norms and opinions of the masses, I'm not strong enough. I'm not a risk-taker. My foot is on the break. 

Deciding how I feel and where to go hurts. 

I'm not smart enough to be this size. 

Do I write down what I eat each day? 

Do I set a weight loss schedule in my bullet journal? 

How often will I work out?

Should I find someone to be accountable to? Or is that one more person to let down? 

I will fail. 

I want freedom and structure. When will I tire of my own bullshit? 

Am I the victim or the perpetrator?

I am hungry now. 

sunday 2:12 am

he looks at me, i assume nothing.

he stares at me again, my tummy flitters. 

i look away.

he waits to walk with me. 

i try to find interesting things to say.

what is funny?

i am home alone.

what r u up to he texts 

no punctuation.

a marriage proposal.

a wedding day to picture.

flaws to be loved

edges to be rounded 

musculature to be traced

sleepy kisses to be had.

i don’t answer. 

i can’t answer.

because when I do,

he will run. 

closings

i want your whisper to be the last thing i hear

your sound will compress air 

pressurize the matter surrounding me 

physical will become electric

then i will leave my body  

my existence reduced to our closing

scripts

barista woman asked

how's your day been

her voice shook

hands trembled 

an innocuous question

a sympathetic response 

a dry mouth 

and darting eyes 

she let her lack of normalcy 

slip

again

she worked so hard to conceal 

her inability to connect

she rehearsed her greetings 

she looked at the weather 

so many hours 

exploded into this 

failed encounter 

it would take months to recover. 

let it enfold you

a stumble, a fall, a shake

clumsy girl, stupid girl, foolish girl

can she hear?

does she know what happened to her?

her cheeks flush

her eyes fill 

she lets it enfold her

she tried

—a quest for zest 

wasn't her fate

burrow

You colonized a piece of my brain. We never met. We share no memories. We've never exchanged fluids. But now, a whiff of NOIR29 makes me nauseous and pulls me beneath the waves of what ifs. 

A writers wife 

Dinner avec nous amis a le Tagine. 

Sweet hearing aid strokes

Laughter when I miss a beat 

Indistinguishable limbs. 

Is that hand mine or yours?

No, it's yours.

And this is mine.

i didn't forget

Did you forget me? 

Did you forget that I was the prettiest girl who liked you back?

Did you forget my lies? 

Did you forget the reality I created for us?

Do you remember what it felt like to be in my bubble?

Do you ever miss it?

Did you ever imagine a future? 

Was it free of a virtual medium?

Did you ever feel like a dick? 

Do you remember when I had my breasts cut off my body and you didn't answer my text?

Were you with her?

Did you forget?

Was it my pessimism that turned you off? 

Or was it my cynicism?

Was it because I didn't want to talk?

Or was it my hearing?

Was it because I was too busy curating a version of perfection for you?

Could you see through my lies?

Was I too fat? 

Should I have showed you my boobs?

Should I have showed you the whole and not just parts?

What's your bubble look like now?

Is your phone still attached to your hip? 

Do you still write about the feelings I gave you?

Do you ever think of me?

Or did you forget?

slipping

Life is composed of open ends, but I feel like it's closing in on me. Somehow, I have turned mine into an ongoing manhunt of myself, in which discomfort and unlikely tragedy chase me throughout all hours of the day. It never catches me, and yet shallow breath catches in my throat, my throat closes, no one will be there to kiss me goodbye. So I weep. I pace the wooden floor. I tear at my own skin like unbalanced kittens on a scratching post.

Wasn't this all suppose to be beautiful. 

Wasn't I suppose to be free.

Didn't I promise myself that I wouldn't get stuck. 

I want to be good at being alone. I want to be the sun. Instead, I hide from myself. I wish I could remember what certainty tastes like. But I am afraid of turning red. Or blue. Or bitter. Really, I am afraid of it all. Of never crawling out of the nightmare. Of dying before I tell the truth. Of considering who I might have been had I not decided I was fated to dissolve without the guiding hands of someone who surely knows better.