the room is quiet

save for the humming of the AC unit

i’m hyperaware of the rise and fall of my chest,

and the stillness of your stare.

i break the silence with heavy words,

stilted and uncertain

i drop them like stones.

but you catch them

and reply without missing a beat

we weave a delicate back-and-forth

threads of tension twisting painfully

the air is saturated with a mournful hesitation

the space between us uneasy

we have reached an impasse

we hold our breath,

unsteady.

i sneak a peek at you from the corner of my eye

and i trace the gentle planes of your face

the familiar slope of your nose and the curve where your hair tucks behind your ear

i allow your smooth contours to quell the tightness in my chest.

i know you can see me looking,

keen eyes, magnets drawn to mine

there is nothing placid about their warmth.

i meet your gaze

and my blood slows.

something in me snaps

and you are there to break my fall,

you pull me close

i whisper an apology into your chest

you rest your chin on my head

for a while you don’t speak.

“i wouldn’t hurt for someone i didn’t love,”

it’s a rumble in your chest

an ache in my nerves

and with that,

the icebergs frozen by years of anguish

begin to melt.

the water levels rise

but i am dry in your arms,

safe and sure

buoyed by the steady thrumming of your heart.

with the passage of years

a lot of things have changed:

i’ve lived a lot of life and learned a lot of things

but they didn’t make me feel the way i thought they would

and by virtue of these new experiences or perhaps despite them,

i no longer feel things as intensely

be that ecstasy or agony, and

i think this is what they call growth

but to me it feels synonymous with numbness

you chose this, you can change it

whispers a voice from inside my sinking stomach,

she wants to help me, she knows me

and i know she is right.

i can feel it in my bones; i am the one responsible.

yet still i am gagged and bound,

i cannot think and i do not know how to feel free again

i have this bounty of useless knowledge;

i know more than i could have dared i would

and i’ve lost the power to express it

the thought of writing what i’ve felt rattles me so thoroughly

i run from my will to create. i race away from my desires with reckless abandon.

a part of me misses those days

when i felt everything so much more acutely

my wounds far deeper and my joy

tumultuous, earth-shattering.

this proclivity for pain, however twisted,

meant there was so much of me left to hurt;

it scares me that i don’t know if this still holds true.

i wonder how that works

why knowing less allows us to be bold,

why the tender brashness of youth gave us such courage.

we grappled our way through this life

in blessed ignorance of our own naïveté;

our rage was volcanic

our love no less explosive and

we did not allow ourselves to be tamed.

and now that most everything has changed,

my head tells me

that every day makes me stronger

and every fight i lose makes me wiser but

maybe this is something i tell myself

to spurn the thought of hope fading from my heart, and maybe

jadedness is a part of something bigger

than the whittling away of time.

maybe reason and rationality are words i use to hide the fact that i give up more easily now,

i can’t bear the shame of admitting this and i don’t have the strength to fight it

so good thing we’ve made circumspection into a pillar of pride and progress,

good thing i don’t have to feel guilty

for walking exclusively on eggshells.

good thing this is normal,

good thing

being careful is all just part of growing up.

when the heat on our backs becomes too much

when our spines feel too brittle to stay straight

and the bones in our wrists begin to splinter

from carrying the burdens we bear

some days I like to dissolve

they tell us to fight

to rage against the dark and chase the dawn 

but once the weakness has entered my bloodstream

I become a puppet with a noose around my neck

without the strength to scream

other days I run to the world

fingernails scrabbling for love, wild eyes 

heaving, open mouthed sobs

bloodied knuckles, bitten 

today I cannot take flight so I fall

lips sealed tight to keep in the frost or the fire

I don't know if I am melting or freezing

but the helplessness does not discriminate

when I was in the ninth grade

I became best friends with a cocaine addict

she was beautiful

before third period she would smear concealer all over her face

with her fingers in the bathroom

in the mornings when she walked into English

her mascara would be spidery, flaking

a crumbling halo that surrounded her bloodshot eyes

her hair was a dull platinum blonde

dishwater brown roots creeping up from her scalp 

ends fried from blowouts and flatirons

when she got changed for gym class

her pale breasts would bulge out of extravagantly decorative bras

"I can't afford these, really"

she would say, but I knew

this wasn't true

for she lived in a mansion up on Liberty Hill

with her two sisters and two brothers

"I used to be anorexic" 

she told me, as we were about to leave the locker rooms

showing me a photo of herself two years prior

ratty hair this time dyed a fox red

ribcage stark against ghostly white skin

then: she put away her phone, entered a bathroom stall

and promptly stuck her fingers down her throat

we would run side by side to warm up

and one day she whispered to me

"I got raped last night"

and I 

who had never even been kissed before

blanched, reeling 

when I got home I hadn't been able to forget, so I vomited

and faked sick the next day

when I tell the story of my past

self-deprecation is my forte 

and people laugh, incredulous

that a goody-

two-

shoes

straight A student

could ever associate with someone like that

I was a comedy of terrors

new kid, no place to go

sitting alone in the bathroom during lunch

before the stoners invited me to eat with them

I left their lunch table after a few months

and went to sit somewhere else

with four Regina Georges

and the only freshman guy on the varsity basketball team

a clan of populars

complete with brand name jeans and 

lokai bracelets,

(all of whom treated me like trash,

but I like to leave that part out of this narrative)

in the tenth grade 

I became friends with the student body president 

she was a senior, flawless,

all five-foot-eight of her.

straight teeth, blinding smile

an infectious laugh, golden skin

a gorgeous honey colored mane

and green-grey eyes that could melt hearts

she was entirely too good for me, I suspect it was pity

that made her take me under her wing

but I was in. and since then it was a series of 

status boosts:

student council, prom committee 

editor-in-chief

junior class vp

start a club

be unique

fuck 

yourself

up

for the sake of expectations

and whatever you do,

don't make friends with the wrong sort of person

but

I never did forget her, 

the kind, damaged girl

who did too much crack

the girl who taught me how to sneak out of my house

to escape my abusive parents

I never did, for I was afraid;

the girl who first told me

the way I was feeling 

was a result of depression

I lashed out at her and went into denial,

I was not broken like her

I wasn't going to let her ruin me

but little did I know how right she was.

after the ninth grade 

I struggled to meet her eyes when I passed her in the hallways

two years went by and we didn't speak

once, junior year, she caught a hold of me

and I was shocked that she remembered my name, but

we made small talk, and she told me my eyebrows looked good

I smiled and gave her the fakest laugh you can imagine,

and I haven't seen her since.

I don't think about her often, because when I do

my skin prickles with shame

because I know

that I am a coward.

this is quite the cage I’m in, you see

suppose it is fear, consider it as such

for my nerves are trembling and my

heart quakes with calamity

for my eyes are open but unseeing and I

acutely sense a thrumming under the veins in my wrist

they lurk long and hardened, bloated and thick

I itch to rip them out

like roots wrenched from damp soil

and still the blood rushes on

soldiering hard and fast through the tunnels of war

so that the walls do not deflate and collapse

and yet

I wish they would, I wish

I could retch and rid myself

of the hesitation that has built a nest in my throat

and I could snatch my fingers away

from the crates full of dreams that lie crumbling on the shelf

and I call out for them but my lips are shut and my cords are cut

so they whisper to me instead

taunting me with their slimy tentacles of doubt

and they drag me into their lair beneath the sea where I

tread lightly

nimble fingers weaving and dripping and swelling and slipping

to build a raft before the waves soar higher, crashing

overhead; and it is too late

sometimes I wonder if it was love or something else

an undeniable magnetism in my bones

or a tremor of the nerves that simply never ceased to consume me

a fluke or a smile

that drew me to you 

when the drinks in our glasses dwindled away and the night drew to an end 

I smirked at you and 

wondered if it was love or something else

that possessed your soul when your breath hitched in your throat and suddenly

your hands were up my skirt and your fingers were caught in my hair 

my body asked me if it was it love or something else

when you plastered me between you and the wall and my eyes rolled up to a heaven I didn't believe in

as your mouth lay claim to my collarbone and 

as your nose folded into my neck

your lips wrote stories of love or something else as they trailed up my stomach and when you kissed me I thought that maybe

love was the lingering taste of the burnt caramel sundae 

we'd shared hours ago and in that moment your skin tasted

of something else

the next morning as the sun filtered through your hair and I 

brushed my nose against the giddy flush that flooded your cheeks 

your eyelashes fluttered and you grinned and then

flipped me over and I was once more disarmed because still I didn't know

if it was it love or something else that made your voice hoarse as dawn

when you told me you'd like to fuck me again

and as your fire burned through every square inch of me

and as our bodies melted into one another and as you

whispered with your tongue between my thighs that

you'd like to swallow me whole and 

as breathlessly between moans I said I wouldn't mind 

I realized that I didn't really care

if this was love or something else.

~

we are dust,

shivering particles of debris huddling close for comfort

to find warmth in this frosted galaxy

look down at your toes and see

that you stand on the edge of a gaping black hole

ease away

or you’ll topple and s

                                 i

                                   n

                                     k

              right through

do you see the shimmering stains on your thumbs and cheeks?

those are residue

from the bones of stars that forgot how to sparkle

you are a spot of color amidst the flickers

the silky darkness envelops you

and you stroll into its absolute embrace

conjuring massive empires with the tilt of your palms

they loom: winking, glittering, masterpieces of will

and disintegrate as you blink

in your eyes reside the moons of jupiter

your smile is one quarter of a sliver of saturn’s rings

your fingers are streaks of silver

grappling with unwieldy torches

balancing comets’ tails blazing in ghostly fire

we drift and we drift

but nothing implores us to settle

for gravity is nowhere in sight,

it refuses to weigh us down.

it’s a game of balance

toe to heel on a fraying tightrope

chin up, nose to the sky

scared, shivering

ankles quivering

be it that the daintiest darling dove

may dare to settle on your shoulder

and you tilt, off-kilter

but her song can halt the winds

perchance you leap

to land on a cloud

and lounge in its pearly embrace, proud

or you fall through it

snatching desperately at gauzy filaments

it dissolves

like cruel cotton candy

and the next one

reaches out with tender palms

to receive you as you plunge

but with not a flutter of the eye

you soar once again and

return to square one or square

eight, if all squares are one

and you perch, nearly hovering; bound

to teeter and trip

or stagger and slip

and yet you continue

ever enduring

merely mustering the courage to cope

always arriving back at the tightrope

and with a sweeping glance you see

the rest of us danglers

perched on knotted threads spanning the sky

some seek exit

but there is nothing else

and some of us

flirt with the edge

tipped forward

arms up and out

wings waiting to unfold

slanted backs and slanted smiles

unafraid to fall or to fly

it had been years away from home

and I trailed behind you through the faded grocery store parking lot

your hand was strong yet frail as you took my hand and we

crossed the dusty asphalt, and I hopped from patch to patch

skipping over the spiderweb cracks

the laces on my hannah montana shoes were short and frayed

silver streaks feebly glimmering over sickly pink patterning

today it was dim and nearly drizzling

but my eyes glistened with a hungry reminiscence

and my thoughts were scrambled, dreamlike

memories of bright eyes and empty heads and youthful cheer

wistfully eyeing the cotton candy clouds hanging from stalls

in their thin plastic bags

tempting me, as if with one bite I should dissolve or

evaporate and become a soft pink cloud in the sky

and I was back in the warmth with careless laughter echoing through my bones and

the sun filtering through red and white canvas tents and the wind riffling through my too-short hair

behind closed lids the hologram of skinned knees and dunking booths

tasted sweeter than those cotton candy clouds I was never allowed to have

today the air was flat as I accidentally stepped on the back of your shoe and

snapped out of my reverie, a sickness spreading through my blood

replacing the hunger in my stomach with dismay

as you snapped back at me and I recoiled with fear, contrite

still we trudged ahead through the noiseless stalls

footsteps crunching to the rhythm of the laughter that was

noticeably missing, and I wondered who stole it

and then from the corner of my eye, a hint

of green, and I looked up in awe as the hunger once more tickled me impatiently

the dragon, with a grin once majestic and proud

leered down at me, perched on wheels rusting from disuse

and I was lost to a summoning impossible to resist as I let go of your hand

green scales once bright were today the color of wilting leaves

in my head echoed screams of joy

veins fizzing with vertigo and arteries of molten honey, a heart full

you approached soundlessly behind me and I turned

catching the tension in the straightness of your back

you looked up at the man behind the fence

and reached into your pocket, hand just barely shaking as you held out the price

three crisp dollars

your face was pale and I knew they were your last

for on your forehead I saw the invisible fluorescent paint

spelling out “UNEMPLOYMENT”

tugging at your shirt I begged you to take us away from here

your words were hushed and unwavering

don’t worry, you said

your voice reassured me but your eyes screamed forgiveness

I complained of a fabricated stomachache

it’s just a silly rollercoaster I said dad,

let’s go home.

as we turned our backs on the old carnival

I lifted my chin and tried to match my pace with yours

the air was cold and you were tall beside me

I took your hand

and it was warm

memories buzz on the tip of my tongue

but I write this to forget

the stars I saw in your eyes

now, under the ice of my gaze

they fracture

on the first day I saw you

my thoughts evaporated

and my mind became air

as your cheeks crumpled and your lips curved crookedly

into a smile you would learn to save just for me

the first time we talked

you laughed and I wanted to capture it in a bottle

as all my inhibitions abandoned all pretense and fled

and I let them.

never come back,

I called out to them as they ran and ran away.

we settled into routine

two heartbeats finding pace

skipping and speeding

too eager to let go and too afraid to settle

one day I looked at you sideways

unable to break this drunken habit

and your eyes were a different color than the day before

and the other day you said my name and those eyes were palest green

a shade of fear new to my soul

and I fought the urge to crush my lips into your ear

and whisper your worries away

the first time I touched you

all my cells blushed barely pink and

I was a cylinder of warmth

but now I shiver

and the ghosts of giddiness in my heart

fracture like the stars in your eyes

when I first met you, you were a constellation

you showed me the way home

even when I wanted to be lost

and you left the heavens and came to earth

you became my oxygen

but it hurts to inhale because with every breath I taste you

and time, time again

I fracture