Silence at a Red Light

I am made to believe
That our face makes a river
Meant to swallow ourselves
Runs to our mouths, filters through our hair, reminding us that we are

Salt
Vulnerable in the waves

I wait on these words, held-

Like silence at a red light

In another sense- I watch you say

it’s hard to say no
I know

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A question:
To the birds flying over your head
Mistaken as a light

I need to know, what it takes

to unsee these

Signs

Like
Scratching you/then clipping my nails

Like
Being the winter/on ground hog day

Like
Dancing with open hands/and letting it all go

Like
Your dog in a kennel/and caged ways to love

It only feels like failure

To be the metaphor
A question:
To the birds flying over our head
Mistaken as a light

Did I nest in these failures too soon?

Did you fail too?

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I’ve lost my sandals shifting through the sale in the waves
crushing these bugs meant to be dead

What is it to be squished between a child’s toes?

To have a home as thin as a shell?
To have my wings plucked, my insides torn out?
Was it the lack of empathy? Curiosity?
Did they promise a coffee date? That the magic wasn’t bullshit?

And to the dared that ate me,

Did you feel my feet crawl down your throat?
Did my intestines remind you of spaghetti?
Or the memory of our dead relatives?

Note to self:
These wings couldn’t have been better; my taste couldn’t have been sweeter.
Flying in the light was always a risk.
Soaking in the sun only brought me this:

My brother told me that protein was my favorite word. But he never knew what it
felt like to be weak, to be eaten, to have the fear of teeth in chicken.
To know

When everything dies, our blood clots

I scrub it from my thong the morning after

Brown peroxide in my sink

We all are told no

We all lose our bets
Does he still play with bugs?

I’ve lost my sandals buried in the dirt

crushing these bugs to death

What is it like to be squished between a child’s toes?

To be as thin as a shell?
To have my wings plucked, my eyes pulled out?
To die before the next coffee date, I clean my hands from the dirt

And to the you that ate me,

Did you feel me claw
Did my intestines remind you of spaghetti?
Or the memory of our younger brother?

Note:
These wings couldn’t have been better; my taste couldn’t have been sweeter.
Flying in the light was always a risk.
Soaking in the sun only brought me this:

My Older brother told me that protein was my favorite word.

Never knowing what it felt like to be weak, to be eaten, to have the fear of Teeth in
chicken.
To know how

The blood clots

I scrub it from my thong

Brown peroxide in my sink
If this dirt digs deep, what coffee would I want to drink?

And to the people with the Teeth,

What does a child see in heaven?
Does he still play with bugs?

Moving between the space of hurting and dating, does dating equal normalcy? To act
like nothing happens? Dating was the space that I entered where I could act like
nothing had happen, that I never lost my brother. I was a normal space that I wasn’t
the eaten bug.
Who are the children?
Who are the people that I date?
Are they related? Develop a pattern
Multiple “they” I need to work out.
Maybe they are the same but in different spaces?
I can continuously bring back the people with the teeth as the people that I ate

The Child/the narcissist

What happens when I mention

These holes
I place this pain
In the hands of children
Their untouched smiled
I reach to scratch

It feels like next week

“we’ll see him soon”
your face will sag
your face will sag

those sunlit eyes

burn on contact
this pain will reach
these nails will scratch

My knotty hair
They want to braid
To make a nest
And take them home

Does it hurt less

if you are a narcissist?

Idea: small book with whisper words on front, dad jokes

I need to write a poem that rhymes

With a joke about how little weed I smoke,

Or the pain in my knees that you feel in your mid 20s
Insidious and constant, my credit cards are fraudulent
Shouting through a cracked door the angels won’t stop calling me a whore
Let their wings take me to the island, breaking my toes on the sand
Telling me I need that “Man”
Stan-ding behind him, being the neck, be that beautiful pseudonym
I don’t care, Karen
Let me get my fingertips in that sand
I’ll sculpt a bowl beforehand
Put my grief in those empty pockets, smell the armpit sockets
Of my siblings who didn’t cry wolf, too young to read beowolf
Too young to have that wrinkle when they smile
Begging me to stay a while
Breathlessness over an alexa
Promising me its gets better ya

Ok, time for seriousness

Watch this

I think I chose to wear that watermelon dress, with watermelon seeds in my hair. By
some point I’ll be tired of dancing with the ants in my shoes. By some point I’ll take a
shower. My brother won’t let me live my hairy legs down, they’ve grown out of
character, I’m beautiful you know. I’m so pretty I hope to text a boy soon, why don’t
I have a boyfriend I’m already 13! Dad’s friend is taking a shower, he slept over the
night before, hurry or we’ll be late. I can see his feet as he dries off from the stairs.
It’s important to note that every Smallville episode at least has one sex scene in it,
and why is the computer always popping up with naked women?! I want to cry
today, when I sang Karaoke my friends said nothing.

Friendless: An Anthem for the Disconnected

Hold your own company in the highest regard.

Don’t be a stranger to your reflection.

A friend gave me a condition: you need to go to therapy.

My head laid down to moments that I had slipped my words in a drunken heat.
Twice I thought that I had slipped. I pressed my interest in the wrong things,
interest in his tattoo, interest in strangers, interest in clear glasses of water. Interest
in what I would soon miss.

I untangle this friend still, replacing them from my loneliness. I miss feeling like the
side character, the –icks to the chicks. I miss the wide eyes and laughs at misplaced
men; the DMs, the receipts. I need this.

The real struggles is the tik toks that call out besties, forgetting that I deleted your
name from my contact list.
My therapist laughed when I told them I felt like I was sitting on a casting couch. I
am always wishing for the best of this.

I am Laundry

I am laundry detergent on shoulders

I am new, anew set of eyes to gaze
I am this skin, thinking of it’s potential
To tangle with you again and again

I am the hand on my jeans

I am the cigarettes in the breathe
I am the high from enigmas and half-truths
I want to see only half of you

Take my mid afternoons

Call this time “mine”
I’ll watch you bite your nails
For the remaining time

I am, forgetting to play

for independence the longer I stay
I am, Swept in waves of sheets and nicer things
I am, Sharing an ice cream to be mean

It must be your fault, touching me in a small room

Feeling for a pulse behind this black skirt
“His Fiance must really love him”
I felt myself say, when he leaves the door open
While they were out to lunch

It must be my fault, being touched in a reflective screen

Pulling my hair looking at my earrings
“Why didn’t you quit?”
And I will when I can, and again “I’m Fine”
Not saying no is an easier way to pass the time

It’s been a while now, a year at best

I doubt that this was heavy; you doubt my lines
I can say yes or no, if you gave me the time