stone butch blues

i want to stay with you forever,
but i can't -and don't- understand.
i want you to hold me so tight that you forget
everything that's wrong with your life
and everything that's wrong with mine,
and everything we said last night
and every time i cried.

i want to stumble home at three in the morning,
sobering up from a night on the town,
with chocolate-covered strawberries covering your mouth,
covering my thighs.
sharing the tastes of desperation, drunk cigarettes, and despair.

i want, and i want, and i don't know what i want,
and i tell myself, "NO,"
and i've gotten so fucking good at it.
of course something had to go sooner or later.

i'm just so, so sorry.

it wasn't that wall that was supposed to break.

cutting

the fact of the matter is simply that,
a fact,
that i am the one left behind this time, you
went ahead and replaced me
we used to be a synecdoche, the parts in the sum of the whole,
what i thought i couldn't live through losing.

i just need someone to believe in
because that person isn't me anymore.

you have met more interesting, honest people and
i still cower from your truths, avoidance
snip, snip, i'm losing touch with gravity and
i haven't found anything else to anchor to,
except stone god fantasies, calculus,
and sweating naked in front of eager eyes.

graphic

(203): I just saw the guy I have a crush on who hasn't talked to me in a week having lunch with a guy who once took off my shirt and then fingered me in his bed. Why.

she dreams about hands (like water, like time) moving,
start fast and finish slow. jazz. rock and roll.
she tries to copy those boys in her dreams,
in her fantasies,
sometimes it's better than the real thing.

she hears his voice through a muddle,
drunken laughter, spinning floors,
and it's a promise, she was right.
all this time later, she was right.

but the question now is if she's ready
to stop being wrong.

countess

for my birthday, i think i'll probably get
a bottle of Southern Comfort and some comforting cash.
I want to grow up this year and I will.

I want clicking heels, cigar smoke, bags of sugar-cocaine,
considering acid, cs_004_handin

% this won't show up in my program.

Blow us up and blow us away, dandelion seeds
dancing in the breeze,
trees bending.

I've been low lately and it's fine,
he hasn't called but that isn't a crime.
Just a wish. Just a design.
Me, I'm left with just a sigh and his back,
like way-back-when, like before.

% MORE HIDDEN MESSAGES, MORE

Let's just talk about it.

yellow eyes

kind of like if somebody was
gnawing at my mandible,
spitting out pieces of imperfection,
devouring the bits of energy, the wrong smiles,
healing the bite marks with salt swollen
into parasitic antibodies.

you don't even know this, you know,
and i'm jealous, and sad, and you
probably don't know that either and
who is punishing who?

"my body has betrayed my desires" but also
kept me from them.

i had a dream last night that i told you,
"sorry, but i can't stop" and we kissed,
slowly, painfully. today i will have to open my mouth.

i don't know why my heart seems to think
that you're the right destination. i should know better.
my mind will change with absence and i will move on again,
kiss others, not in dreams. live with no regrets.
never make amends.

i've had a lot of time
to think.

me, the pirate queen

when by the end of the day i feel
stretched out like my holey sweater,
couldn't hold together for the whole
six hours i've been dressed like this,
you want to text me "hey" and i think that
maybe my mistake has been
only underestimating your adoration,
and i don't know if i have more of a
conscience than she suspects or if i am just
not yet well-travelled enough
but i do not want to lead you on,
i only want to enjoy a few hours,
i overestimated your proposals and i
should have maybe
waited a week to spring it on you,
not talked, not thought, taken what i want
and then beg innocent later
when you realized you actually wanted more.

bao (or: treasure)

i sweeten my coffee and stare at the orange skyline,
read shiny magazines and judge myself,
pretend to be above the acidic paint on the stairwells and
appreciate.

remember, we married our fortunes together. and i
want to tell you everything. plan elusive and reduce
my confused state of rejection, i'll take my affection on the
high road and leave you alone.

i've been gambling with clocks, stealing stranger's socks,
i've evolved but i haven't changed and so wasn't i right from the beginning?
it breaks my heart a bit and i'll admit it to you -
you're the only person who could understand
when i reference that aged conversation and propose that sand
beat the rush by shrinking til the waves could do it no harm.

(tell me it's not true if it's not true, but don't lie to save me.)

but oh, but oh, where have you gone?

squashy purple sleeping bags

i feel now like he can't hide anymore,
can't pretend to not be even slightly impressed by me,
slightly awed,
slightly turned on because there is only so much
that you can conceal behind an accent and a robe and
a cynical air and i stopped trying to care
and now the words come effortlessly and we've moved past touch
(something i've been craving just a tad bit too much)
with my feet on his chest and his hands on my breasts and a rhythmic coughing
and clearwater and dawn.

how to handle morgan, among other things

it's a fucking monsoon out there and sometimes it seems like i'm the only one walking through it but tonight we're going out and tonight i'm not going to drown and tonight is a night on the town and tonight's gonna be a good night.

rain falling from the eaves like a waterfall and nobody drew the ace but she pulled up like the queen of diamonds my best friend and we raised our plastic cups to the ceiling fan and the stick-on stars the only ones we've had and it was a good night.

she didn't get a handle that time but it was a good night. go tell the captain i remember it.

vampires is a bit strong but...

veins in arms, earnest eyes,
stroking back your hair, playing, there.

i hadn't realized what i missed until i got it,
stars and the wind through my hair, solitude and sugarland

but luck is the last thing on my mind when i'm visiting,
encouraging strangers with a light touch and quick thinking,
head over heels for blond boys with beers and i'm not even drinking
elliptical sorrow so he's nowhere near,
i'm too far away because this isn't home.
i want the sweat and the signal,
the blood and the bone,
sleep deprivation, bathrooms with locks,
happy smoked hallways and the Jabberwocks.

(i only wish they were prettier)

fall into me

I am Jill's bitten nails,
hammered into gaping holes,
sagging down with a heavy load,
bending under the weight of art for art's sake.

I am Jack's empty wallet,
diamond dogs and lost credit cards,
sunk below light's reach with pirate boots.

but I am not,
and I am your blue-eyed wanderer,
blue-lined warrior, the burn of whiskey in the back of your throat,
the brazier in your belly.
I am an impermeable flannel shirt.
I am a princess poster and your first memory.

worn

cleaning out the closet,
metaphorically and not
wanting to get rid of it,
wanting and not.

internal war:
the cleaning-crazy-remodeling-lady vs.
the collecting-protecting-intuition.

i should be writing a letter.

shells

dirty little redhead boy
(devil spawn, satan's child)
playing in the sand
(mutters curses at me for a while)

we're fine here,
underneath the ping-pong tables
and the blond waiters.

I'm dirty, too, but he's smiling.
Until we get home, and the older one
(he's supposed to be better)
starts shouting, losing his temper,
and I bike home, still dirty,
with the crushed beauty of the shells in my pocket.

everything that changes in a year

the sunshine filled my heart to bursting,
i skipped and sang and tried my hand at transposing,
couldn't edit out my mental voice but walked fast,
not paranoid but cautious,
and i'm glad it was mine before i was yours.

but i miss being in love.

something from graduation era (lost and found)

the thunder exploded my eyes to open
and the glass on the floor, broken
needled its way into my heels, dragging
feels like the right thing to do, sagging
under a heavy load of what-won't-work.
even if i only wanted a skirt.

witchcraft queen

bewitch me, whisper
sweet nothings in my ear,
wide innocent eyes.

tempt me, offer more
with your hands than i can
with my years, i've packed a cougar
and a change of clothes,
nothing more or less.
a little desire
for some fire and some rest.

(Miss Boleyn, i've got so little to lose
i'm not bothering to choose,
but i think i don't regret it.)

insomnia

it creeps back in when you least expect it,
edging around the screen door,
flitting up the stairs, and i'm
just too damn tired to fight it,
my mind still pounding like a battering ram.
"Kill the beast!" legs twitch,
arms shift, and the downpour won't flood the streets
tomorrow, i won't take the heat,
but God willing, i just might get some sleep.

crush

guns erupt with a thwop and a thunk
and a tiny explosion of starch on the green
while boisterous blond memories tap dance
and fraternize across this last week and
this god-awful pain up the side of my skull

easy to say that you love me, kid,
easier still to believe i'd love you back
but he'd never fold an iris into my curls
and you should hold out for some other girl
somebody who isn't running to end up in the gutter.

retrograde

my hands are weathered,
more agile and less learned
but the soap is the same.
a rough antiseptic wreaking havoc on my
unbitten cuticles and lined palms

and she tried to curry favor with jamaica
came out jaundiced, salted, cruel
but lilac proud

i am the cherry taste on your lips
and the years you can't forget

i am your mistake; you are my restraint.
regret me if you choose,
but i will practice you

mysterious

i wanted to return the favor and
so i made an inquiry in your name but
he sort of shot me down with more words than
i've ever heard him use but then
a few hours later i went back to grab my things
saw him sitting on the couch and watched him sing
and baby, i can't tell you any more now
than i thought i could before but i tried,
yeah i tried and i'm sorry that he hurts you.
yeah i'm sorry that he hurts you,
and not just when it hurts me too.

everybody's got a little schizophrenic going,
everyone's a sinner, talking to themselves,
everybody's bound for heaven, less of course they land in hell
and i see your bipolar and understand
and i love you anyway
and he just sees a selfish struggle.

so let's call him a Muggle,
and wash our hands clean of it.