i hope that you're good
or at least feeling the way that you know you should
because when all i wanted was a reason to stop believing
you were there for me in the freezing cold
saying please don't leave me here and i feel like you understood

it's an l for an l let the pain unfold
there's a letter on the table signed with marigolds
i've been writing my retrospective on being constantly neglected
but now i know
it's just a matter of perspective and i'm finally letting go

like i know that i should
this year i wrote a stagnant storyline
it took a lot of time to find a reason to live my life
when you had disregard for mine
so whatever this is i don't know
but for once i finally feel like i'm the one in control

it's an l for an l let me gain control
i never thought that this feeling would ever lose it's hold
i'm sick of being so deflective and holding in all of my affection
but now i know
it's just a matter of time it gets better tomorrow

where do you see yourself ten years ago

warm shoulders

some day i will take the fish tank out of my basement
and i will clean off all the dust from the things that i love
one day i will remember all of my dreams chalked on the pavement
eventually i'll finally learn how to give a fuck
but probably not
you said that i could be much more happy
if i could think of myself the way i think of everybody else
but this cycle repeats and you smoke more weed
you said that all of this was sweet
but i can't make somebody feel complete

i am done with feeling loss
i will find something on my own for once
i am done with feeling loss
i will find contentment on my own for once

swordtails

would you write me a haiku about change
i need something to bring me comfort when nothing will ever stay the same
and i know that you're looking forward to having some space
but when my conscience starts drifting it will find itself in a very toxic place
it's screaming that
every good thing you ever find will either end or leave you behind
so i will make the whole page black
and you can take your sharpie marker back
i will not have a good summer

i know i know i know i know i know i know
i will distance myself from my friends
and feel my organs slowly sink and descend
'til i'm shaking on my sofa
feeling anxious and alone
like all of my options are dead ends
because i'm scared of melanoma
if you venture into my home i hope your goggles are infrared
and my brain does apoptosis while i process my emotions
it's a needle on the weakest thread
and what is my prognosis if i go through all the motions
and it means nothing in the end
fuck

hackberry

i'm pinching everything with clothespins
i won't forget the pain of seeing you forget
we spend our whole lives building something
but it always comes to this

plastic straws and styrofoam cups
a voice in my head saying just give up
just give up
because you were wholesome and sweet
while i am dirty and cheap
you were everything that i wish that i could be
i wish that i could be

so talk to me with violins
and bottle up all of your deepest regrets
the clouds in our heads are crushing
it makes it harder to exist

plastic straws and styrofoam cups
a voice in my head saying just give up
just give up
because you were wholesome and sweet
while i am dirty and cheap
you were everything that i wish that i could be
i wish that i could be

it was grace that taught my heart to fear
the way that everything is more fragile than it appears
the very fabric of our memories that can fade in a year
i will always hold you so near and dear to my heart
before you left me you wrote you'd always visit
that you'd be close enough to speak and listen
you were a cardinal in the snow
you were bright in a world of sorrow

so you can show me love and set me free
you were everything when i needed you to be
i needed you

clothespins

something better
you're always finding something better than me
i don't know whether or not
if it's all of my fault or just a clever way to say:
"you'll never be in love and belong"
fuck, you knew this all along

so i'll pull the sheets over my head
i guess i'm staying in my bed instead

it's not worth your time
sometimes time is worth more dead than alive
and i know that you thought this was all of your fault
or that you always overthink
"a childhood that i can't recall"
fuck, do i know myself at all

so i'll pull the sheets over my head
i guess i'm staying in my bed instead

i know that it's not you
and i know that it's not me, too

it's probably just the shit that we have been through
and it sucks that we have to face it alone
we've worn the same pair of shoes
its broken all of our toes
it fucking sucks
thought it finally felt like home and we'd continue to grow
but now i'm back to all i've known

i know that it's not you

postponed

i always found myself sifting through the photos
scattered on our pink carpet floor
you always find the same damn one of me sitting on my kitchen floor
covered in temporary dragon tattoos
hanging with pastel balloons
and it's not alright
sometimes the dragon would grow inside
and it's not alright
you made it so dark i could never see the light

i feel the panic grow inside will you sit with me on my roof tonight

i always found myself with a book climbing high in oak trees
just to feel alone
and now you decide to cut down my only home away from home
and it's not alright
i'll never let go of anything in sight
it's not alright
i'll assign meaning to the smallest things in life

i feel the sadness grow inside will you stay with me in my tent tonight

i always found myself in a blanket fort
playing games on a crt
would always honestly do anything to escape my reality
and it's not alright
i'll never face a thing in my life
and it's not alright
things have always been this way i don't think i'll ever escape

i feel despondence grow inside will you dance with me at a show tonight

balloons

space heaters for cold souls
i've been replacing my house plants with plastic
deleting pictures off my phone
putting blankets and pillows deep into my attic

because all sense of comfort is fleeting
and this tape of your voice is in my head repeating:
"patience is key, you'll be happy someday"
but look at me with the wind in the trees, why can't that be today
have faith that it will be okay
we'll just have to find some way through this endless self dismay
just think of what it was like before you met me

folded maps spread across my floor
i've been replacing my tap-water with beer
and no matter where i go i'll feel alone
turn my tv to static for atmosphere

because all sense of comfort is fleeting
and this tape of your voice is in my head repeating:
"patience is key, you'll be happy someday"
but look at me with the wind in the trees, why can't that be today
have faith that it will be okay
we'll just have to find some way through this endless self dismay
just think of what it was like before you met me

well shit, i guess i can try
i've been cursed with trauma early in my life
waking up and wondering why
constantly looking for flaws in myself
and find a hint of meaning in somebody else
any connection i've felt has a pre-determined time
that i become a bummer or a total bore
and talking to me becomes a chore
maybe time will heal but now i feel like i am stuck in a landslide
and i don't know how to cope
i'll take any distraction that i know
so take me as i am and leave me how i was
you said a pit of snakes wouldn't change us
i thought that i was finally in love
you were everything in the world to me
but i was never enough

b4umetme

i am done trying to make my loneliness poetic
because you've proven to me that love could never be
anything but synthetic
and i cannot find perspective viewing life as beautiful
now the only option for me could be pharmaceutical
i want to find solitude on a dark and distant planet
where i can confine and redefine those things you said before
time goes by
but your words remain nuanced and obscure
and now i'm left here
with a pain i can't endure

we had so much in common it could kill me
like the times we'd hike in the woods
searching for our favorite flowers blooming
so i lay in my bed vacant staring blankly at my ceiling
because everything i used to love to do will only bring me back to you
bring me back to you

nothing is different

there's a conch shell on my nightstand
it used to be a soft warm color
i could bring it to my ears and hear waves and shorebirds
chirping in its little atmosphere
like it was connected by a string
to a yucca on the coast where you had tethered your line
i could feel the sand in my hands
slowly sifting through my fingers
and collecting on the floor like it was an hourglass
there's a conch shell on my nightstand
its colors have been fading away
i bring it to my ears and hear nothing but white noise
buzzing and silence on the telephone
like the wire on my shell is cut
footsteps in the sand soon to be erased by the wind
i would toss my beer glass into the ocean
breaking waves and currents smoothing the shattered edges
and when it finally returns to shore you'll think:
"that's a neat little piece of glass" and give it as a sentimental gift
without knowing the context
i would scream at the sun and the clouds
for not being as warm as they were this summer
as if they have a choice
there's a conch shell on my nightstand
nothing has changed except my perception
i wish i could still experience the soft warm color that it was

the worst part of everything
it's so bad
you couldn't respond to me
i know that i'm defenseless
i shouldn't be
need to focus on whatls in front of me
i'd rather be oblivious then broken
are they sharks or are they dolphins

i just want to know
when did everything change does it feel better when you let go

losing your voice

my two best friends live two doors down
on either side of my house in my hometown
still i don't have the nerve to go out
there's bugs on my brain but i feel no pain
no matter where i go i'm never moving towards
the person i want to be
someone who can be happy where they're at in a place in time
someone who can be honest with what's eating away at their broken mind

i don't know where to start
from the customary cold concrete walls conjoining corners in our hearts
where arachnids craft their chthonic castles castling over us
and i decompose because i've seen the human centipede
one too many times to know what's good for me

it's as you suggested i am over-invested in these negative thoughts
and i can't live in the present-tense
it's depressing how i'm never present
but may i suggest that i'm the manifest of everything surrounding me
these past six months
i'm the parking garage

because i don't know where to start
from the customary cold concrete walls conjoining corners in our hearts
where arachnids craft their chthonic castles castling over us
and i decompose because i've seen the human centipede
one too many times to know what's good for me

canopy cover