it is still beating

Close my eyes held my breath; I am on life support, surviving on invisible tubes
in order to get anywhere far far from me.

Stop.

Stop.

Holding my breath.
Eyes closed
Listen,
Listen,
to my heart beat drumming in accordance to the tintinnabulation of the raindrops hitting an aluminum trashcan outside my childhood home.

Summer is over, and fall, and it is winter and I am still selfish.

But selfish is only one of my truths, and you are one of my truths and I alone am one.

Denying/defining that spring when my spirit wasn’t my own and what that attachment cost me. Cost me my life, my life. I lived on life support, an oxygen tank now there’s a suture where the breathing goes,

Open it up, pull it out and you’ll see it is still beating.

Now when the ghost from a past knocks offering a gift, giving me its time, I look ahead, move on, for every time I held its hand.

Open it up, pull it out and you’ll see it is still beating.

Remember that time I was sprawled out on the floor like an unassembled puzzle?

Open it up, pull it out and you’ll see it is still beating.

I am not crawling, or crying, I am a bore.

Open it up, pull it out and you’ll see it is still beating:

since then,
I have fallen asleep early and watched the evening news, 4 times.

Last night I laughed
And recently, again.

When watching a breakdown from the distance,
its easy to call in kind words,
a kind smile putting it all down so carefully,
wiping it all off gently…
and when its our turn to break
really really break to the point of progressing
it finally makes sense.

Open it up, pull it out and you’ll see it is still beating.

Finally I am able to tune it out. Tune into want feels right for me.

But it’s for the moments, when I denied
that the me that exists today
ever mattered.
Its for those times, those the times I thought I shouldn’t have come here.
At every corner that I bent smiling and every alley I handed my wallet over without a fight.
For every promise I really believed in and every time I cursed the God that my faith asked me to hang on to. For the time I didn’t stop reading for four days because I needed a distraction and the time I got upset at a guilty man, preaching.

Remember that time you fell and I ran back to help you up and I ended up losing?

For the way I washed remnants of an old lover’s footsteps away with my tears and called out with my voice sounding like a death threat.

For the panties barely put in my purse before going home two days later.

And the time I lied.
And the time I left.
And the time I ran
And the time I hid.
For the winter and the way it seems to mourn the death of the past year.
For the winter and the way it looks like the morning of the year to come.
For the horrible angry, badly written poetry- I can’t help but write out.
And the way I rephrase things in hopes of being heard.
For the way I treat her like I am sight-see-her and she is vacation.
For every time I ever thought something would cost me too much.
For every time I thought too hard.
Or stayed too long
For everytime I’ve closed my eyes, held my breath.

Please, open it up, pull it out and you’ll see it is still beating.

bones

+

1
“Do we build houses with cards that eventually fall to say that we tried? Why me, or why not me?” It was something I read- handwritten on a bottle of Carlo Rossi one night and I lifted a smile and gaily said cheers to the freedom from entitlement I felt at that moment. I had nothing to gain, or lose or give and so I made believe this was really, really, really what I wanted. Until it really was what I wanted.

but, what I really wanted was…

2
No one calls past midnight and my phone has been busted for over two months…I know that I am not always a very good friend I know I can be better and I know I will be.

When you drove off I thought I would see you later.

3
Later I found the heaviest weights only gets heavier by not apologizing for what I should of and instead apologizing for getting bumped into, or for loving someone too long, or for needing alone time to think about what I should really be fu ckin g sorry about.

4
For a long time I sat on the edge of a thirty-seven floor future and holding good old stories out the window letting them fall as I realized they really were only older now.
Not necessarily afraid but comfortable with nothing left to loose. The only thing I had was mine and mine alone and they were my junkyard-rust-heavy-memories.
I thought of how cruel my mother seemed for raising me with faith and how innocent she was…I thought eventually how in a way she way right and I thought,
“thank God that’s over.”
Only I didn’t capitalize the “G” in the word God because it’s mostly vague from where I stand. Sometime soon, I got up and found shadows to smile in. I smiled and smiled.

I thought about how life is really mush simpler than we make it out to be, and then I found you. Or you me? I don’t really know since we were drinking.

5
You were miles away before and I forgot how to sleep so I watched your rib cage, hold your lungs and watched your lungs boast and then cower. I watched you for hours until I couldn’t take it much longer and I woke you, I woke you and asked if you knew,
“how many bones are in our bodies” and then I said
“well, but really, “I love you.”
(Ignore the questions about the bones; I only wanted to tell you the second part)

6

I have never been so gentle, so careful. Last night I dreamt of many pairs of socks that I never got around to trying on. When I woke up I noticed you had put a straw in my spine and you were drunk. So I showed you where there was a suture. I told you to open it up, pull it out and you’ll see it is still beating.

I didn’t mean to startle you,
only meant to thank you.

+

certain parts, you cannot have

You know, I’ve said goodbye to you 3 times already. Secretly I did, when you weren’t looking. We’ve all got secrets, now you’ve one of mine

I never told you, goodbye, because I just wanted to be sure, be sure that you’d be okay
(if I stuck around)

The first time I said goodbye was when we first met. I thought it was too honest, too sober, but you tasted like Rum and so we both got drunk instead.

Then, when you went away for a week, I thought here is my chance to save you the trouble, so I made fists and prepared to go away for a week upon your return. Only, there was a day between us and you came over. You opened my fist and handed pineapple pancakes and tummy turning laughter. The next day I went away for a week, and missed you.Recently before I could stop you, I was reminded of a cause and effect, a before and an after, I was reminded of where I’ve been and where I refuse to go. I would wait until tomorrow to say it.

We drank coffee and talked. We were quiet.

I sat you down on a chair in the kitchen and I traced the red of your scalp hidden inside all of your thick hair. I looked over you, but never at you.
Your body was foreign and I handled you like a test of my will (I failed)

Fumbling my fingertips, my eyes glued to the linoleum while pulling lint off my tights I said, “There are certain parts of me you cannot have.”

Looking right at me you said,
“I understand, there is no making up for emotion that is stolen”

So
I
never told you, goodbye, because I just wanted to be sure, be sure that you’d be okay
(if I stuck around)

Thoughts while listening to a friend think of love.

I had just woken up from a life gone when you showed me your antique dark blue dress decorated with delicate ornate beading. When you were little you always wanted something nice.

“Isn’t it nice?” You asked and continued talking to me about the assholes and the lovers you had cut up and put in your freezer. You’re a horrible at playing unaffected especially when I can see the scrapes and scars on your knees and knuckles. I wanted to warn you of the possibilities that sometimes love doesn’t come in a letter written out and addressed to you. I wanted to hold you, keep you steady, when the ground came beneath your feet. It would be something small to cause it to all come down.

I didn’t want you to go through your personal apocalypse.

Instead I told you how
I sometimes buy plants. I don’t know how to care for them and don’t make an effort to learn. Usually the soil dries out and the leaves brown. Sometimes I’ll be drinking iced green tea, watching Little Britain and pore some tea into the pot. It’s always too late.

manual

i was one who was taught
to be quiet whenever
i laughed too loud, got too angry or hurt too much
and when the guilt i felt for breathing came crawling out of my skin
i knew nothing in the world was better quiet, and a lil nyquil
i was taught fear

girls like me were ugly enough to be hit
and pretty enough to be forgotton
with our boring brown eyes
and sincere “i love you”

and when life said bend bend bend or break
i sat there twisted as a pretzel
on the verge of tears, still smiling

so if i can hand you an explanation
a manual of sorts
before you get lost in the romance of courting
before you do what you can to get what you want
before you disappear

don’t waste your time with decorations
not for me at least

i am not going to bite your head off
or curse your mother for creating you
i’ll most likely curse that god i’ve got hanging on the wall

good or bad and let me deal with how much
truth you have

because by nature i have quiet footsteps
because by experience i have logic
because i might just like you
but not as much as i like me

you see my knees are scratched and sore from
praying and
blow jobs

both done with everything in me

and if you desire, feel free to lock the door behind me
because there is good reason to believe i’m not coming back

i am still sensitive to the weight of promises and gossip

to a little alcohol and sex

i’m sewing the wholes in my pockets
but now i’m reading instead of screwing,
sighing instead of crying,
and planning instead of forgetting

and if you ask me i’d say that it sounds like a life without much room left for
an alarm clock, a waiting room or a polygraph test
now, sweet sweet sweetness,
i like you, isn’t it obvious by the way
i say with a smile, “that’s something charming” about you when you aren’t around
and say “hello, baby” when you call (only the second word is silent)

and when you say “hi beautiful” i cover up the fact that i heard you by making up a nonsense joke about red butterflies going across the moon
cover up how much i like the way it sounded,
its like hearing you say it is an exclamation point to how you make me feel.

because i like my autonomy and those sub-sort-of-lover clothes
i used to wear no longer fit me i won’t tell you how
the next time we meet i’ve schedule time with my mirror
to stand alone in front of to take inventory of my ribs, two legs, my bellybutton
my heart

i will say out loud to the army which is my body
“prude!” i will say “whore!”

i will laugh really loud at my absurdity
and see how my body parts react
and find something in between, to wear.

before i see you i will say i need nothing and know that it is true
i will curse any fear in you
and believe you’ve none
i will pretend i am going down on a rollercoaster and my stomach
is giggling and i will pack a puzzle of color beneath my eyelids in case i get bored
since i glued all my broken parts back together there is very little i fear anymore
so i am ready for you to love me, forget me, move me, remove me

i am ready to remember your twitching fingers on my skin as you fall asleep
i am ready for the fairytale of the song that is being played on my hip bone.
i am also ready for you use me against every good intention you had
or for you to like someone just that much more than me
i am ready to hear that you say that you hope i understand how special i am
(i do, i do, i do)
i really do, so don’t you fret.
because there is honesty and integrity
and curiosity and bravery
there is pain and survival and
gains and losses
and smiles and tears and that’s not all there is
there are warm baths and glasses of wine
and a good books and enough time
there are dancing in chaos or in the comfort of socks
there is you and there is me
there is me…
i was one who was taught to be afraid
but regardless,
along the way I've learned not to fear.

Lemonade

I considered agreeing with you on a certain memory uncompromised by the two of us for certain; it would have inspired something out of us - the numb.
So obviously unbalanced and excessive
I squeezed two whole lemons, added 8 tablespoons of sugar and put it in a gallon of water.
I called it lemonade
You called it sour
Or my sun-lit-salt-smelling-sex
You said was "a way to wake up"
Or the joke you explained
That I said, "I got it-but it's just not funny"
I wish I could have inspired a poet in you
But you only said, "can you put your shoes away?"

My shoes in the living room
Planted, for you to trip over
So that I can climb you
Bite into your skin
Find some poetry.

the german

he
drinks cutty sark
watches the discovery channel
eats the left over lasagna i made with
kraft american cheese (that no one else will touch)
he takes me fishing every week still
even though i am too old to talk to him sweetly
and too young to talk you him with respect
its been years since he quit smoking but
he smells of smoke and whiskey and hearty smiles
he tells me what a good cook i am
and that my hair looks nice today
he hands me condoms
and begs me not to have sex yet
he loves my mother the way i won't see again
until my brother meets his wife

i am eighteen
seeing my father for the last time

he is sitting on the couch
drinking cutty sark and
eating the left over lasagna i made with
kraft american cheese (that no one else will touch)
he says, "you're a good cook"
and i forget to say,
i love you.