10 – f r a i l .

i’ve all

but just

forgotten

what it’s

like to be

not fading.

9 – over (and over it)

same old cycles

like nothing changed

but everything did—

.

like a magnanimous

nothing, all this

.

nervous illusion built

by someone who

could do nothing but

destroy everything.

8 – dorm day blues

i’m back again

anxiety seeping in

the crevices of my

shivering bones

and devouring me

inside out again

though there’s already

nothing left…

7 – next time, just leave it to the experts

disasters—

panic and dark stains

look at the mess

you’ve made…

.

run boy,

why don’t you?

fix the damage

and change chaos

.

disasters—

soaked shirt and beige

just look at the

mess you are…

.

run boy,

why don’t you?

save all the saints

and give ’em hell.

6 – sleepiness

i’m sorry if i ruined your saturday night

your weekly vigil on unsafe city streets—

but my apologies are so vague now,

almost as vague as your vintage excuses;

though not quite. not just quite.

i won’t be another reason, another blur,

on your photo album faux perfection.

so for now, my pretence will be pretend

and i’ll keep my tired eyes open just enough

for you to blind me with a second-late camera flash.

5 – of cold coffee & cough drops

midnight air, unsettled

mingling against red beanies

.

caramel and salt, lost to

frothy aftertastes, tingling teeth,

and dying inkstains—

.

them, me, lifeless

.

small talk and smaller affinities

a drowsy pill for a drowsier mind.

4 – half-burnt toast

a freckle on your nose

u n c e r t a i n t y ;

and a delicate acceptance

of what they thought they know…

what you thought you knew.

rub it off, impulsively,

staring down the cold sun—

it’s lower than this afternoon

like the sky sank around it instead

of the other way around…

silk curtains fresh with dust

and an alarm clock that acts like

a hatchet clean down your

confused head, splicing

your migraine in half like a

raging hydra having a bad day.

melanin is lost to sunburn;

quietly-peeling skin picked on

like trying to remove the memory

of a bad vacation, and

u n c e r t a i n t y g r o w s —

the toaster flies off into eternity.

3 – season’s greetings, then.

it’s been a lovely holiday

and i don’t regret staying

just a little bit longer for it—

but at the end of the day,

it’s just that: a holiday.

a couple weeks of phantasm

before the veil is unlifted

again to reveal a worse hell…

it’s been a fun holiday, it has.

but it changes nothing.

2 – 10 a.m. backaches

sad, tinted vision

a kind of tiredness that

violates the soul itself

.

tense bodies twisted in shapes

their spinal columns bent

almost to a fractal fracture

.

cold sighs, half-meant

an almost corpse-like shiver

instinctive, twitchy, mere impulse

.

tender bruises, counted;

stitches, pulled out again

me, your modern marionette.

1 – hope your heart gets soon

it’s all coming back to me now…

that laugh, half-remembered.

vicious dreams, buried under deep

in an attempt to submerge

my own brain in a vat of denial.

your charm; reckless, relentless—

so fucking interesting to me.

i thought i’d already let you out of

my system, but sometimes i still

get a little sick of myself and the way

you swim under my tangled veins

so that i can’t bleed you out.

oh, we did have some good times,

before my distractions tumbled down

the stairs and it shattered along

with the fragile illusion of you.

it never mattered much, but i tried

to hide it away until then, and before

now—shameful, pathetic, deluded.

but i try, h. i don’t know why i do,

and i don’t know why you’re returning

to the shallow depths of my mentality

when i least expected it—it’s been

three years now, i have counted.

and still; when the countdown ended,

when the ball dropped and everyone

kissed their friends and bubby glasses

and cheered at deafening fireworks,

i still found my midnight sky to be lit up

with your most distant memories.

it’s all slowly coming back to me now—

that youthful smile, half-forgotten.

violent dreams, making me scream

in an attempt to capture my attention.

the doubt and insanity of it all…

i don’t know if i mind having it back again.