red rusts the nails of hate in my chest puncture wounds nested in congealed thoughts that slowly creep into the open space i created to keep me away and safe twisted up in my mouth is everything i want to say but can't fit through the vines i've wrapped around myself
simple and unknown, i came to you i unearthed the truth of me and let you plant my seed as i formed you leaned on me but before i could snap, i set myself free i caught the hands of another to settle me but you left your weight with me and i never settled and i've snapped
you ask me how i'm doing and i say i'm doing fine you ask me how i'm doing and i always give that line but i'm not ok and neither should you be i'm not ok and that's ok with me
regret stains my heart
and seeps through my skin
until everything is a different shade of broken
you've emptied your pockets into the deep
leaving me with your good-intentioned anchors
fish-hooked in my ankles
and i bleed to appease this sea of everything we were
but the waves keep pulling me in
i keep cursing your name
but hoarding your love beneath my breast
cracked ribs and cinched chest
keeping you close to the nest
i kept in its place just for you
little bird full of fright
will she ever take flight
--with disjointed wings jutting from her insides
she frets and flaps while bones crack
and her feet are fixed to the precipice of everything that was
if you can't leave 'em with a laugh you can leave 'em sawed in half I'm hoisting the white flag and hanging it half-mast see I've got past experience I know the shape of a casket keep the question on your tongue it doesn't mean you didn't ask it I'm composed of screeching static a vaguely man-shaped panic underneath all the anxiety the depression's feeling manic like whoa there partner wait your turn we've got another bridge to burn and contents of a leaky gut to empty up here in the churn forty years all haunted by the specters of the spectrum unsure which monsters mean him harm and which want to protect him either way he's gobbled up a hollow bag of bones to crunch here lies the living memory of a life completely motherfucked spent a decade seeking comfort in the powders and the potions and hands that turned to sand gone sifted when he tried to hold em now he's shifted or replaced all of the idols on his totem but no bell's ever been unrung sometimes broken
a.
silent, 'neath
surface turbulent,
and aware
of the shipwreck;
an impossible grace
that flickers within eyes
panicked.
b.
she blacked out before she hit the water,
thrown violently overboard by the tempest.
submerged for some seconds before
a gravity reversed, dragging her body
to shore.
c.
where they meet,
eyes locked with flushed cheeks.
she can't believe this bright angelic scene.
silk hand on her throat, she does not scream,
she hopes her thanks radiates
to this being.
d.
myth lips glide closer to her,
humans are such strong reflections
when not armed; belligerent shapes
of water asking for more, for god,
for mercy.
e.
for this pass
you weigh something like gravity
in my tired expanse. you are
sand;
(my once splendid mountain)
my love is the ocean
that has worn you down.
with my monstrous tongue,
i pulled you in.
as you fall,
sweeping peacefully into the depths
and filling each crevice,
i am learning to inhale shores.
some would say i'm suffocating
and bring me buckets of air (only to have it
escape my slippery grip).
no, the tides need something heavy
to make of her
a home.
i.
you were 22 years in the making,
a sponge without water
since the day they plucked you from the ocean
and left the sea salt to sink into your pores.
ii.
I was something too heavy to wade in,
barely able to breathe,
21 years in the making
with floodgates barring my emotions
since the age of four.
iii.
At the first sign of droplets,
the salt of you drew me in
and eased the heaviness of my heart.
iiii.
In your confessions of self-love,
in your tales of embrocation,
I was only ever your liniment;
our brevity
was a thing to be forgotten from the start.
i've rearranged the rooms of my chest
to make room for you.
i won't say it didn't hurt
to make myself your Adam;
removing rib
after rib
until you found a comfortable perch.
there, beneath my unguarded breast,
you construct your nest of
every lovely thing you've come to love
about me
(while the rest of me flaps wildly
like moth wings against the cold walls
of my exposed heart).
i should've known you'd leave
when winter froze me.
don't apologize [for the ache].
you kept the beautiful bits of me
warm
(while they died).
cut me.
press your metal into my spine.
thread it gracefully
along my insides and out
the nape of my neck.
twirl it gently (don't
hurt yourself) around my skin.
boast proudly, how you shaped me,
how you spun me in your arms,
how you affixed my gaze upright...
how you made me look so perfect
while i slowly turned and died.
and I still keep running into parked cars by Hfeather53, literature
Literature
and I still keep running into parked cars
Mama,
your baby girl's swimming
in dead of the night
hair, scarred knees,
overgrown weeds, and
countless pairs
of shoes-
with those
orange and yellow wheels
that hug my toes
and heels
I'm running into
parked cars
trying to get
my kite to fly
and hiding under
dashboards
listening to you
fight
I'm rummaging through
boxes of secrets
that Daddy tried
to hide-
solving puzzles with pieces
I'll never uncover
in these thoughts
of you
faithful and quietly distant by Hfeather53, literature
Literature
faithful and quietly distant
i was given a belly of rocks;
each stone asks, "plant me," so i do.
each spring blesses me with the same stony seeds,
and i thank the god of my childhood
for his faithfulness -
i continue to dig up what i've buried,
but i wonder,
what of the blood from labor-worn fingers
and the sweat
and the lust that i've spilled each season -
where is my return on that?
the god of my adulthood stays silently distant
while i groan along with the pebbles,
"use me?"
and i dig,
and i dig.
"use me,"
the rocks cry and i join them,
begging the dirt for kindness and the heavens
for answers the earth has swallowed and
yet to spit-up.
i haven't written in a while, i think my meds are helping me sort my feelings into thoughts for the first time in a while... when your emotions are the ocean, and you're just a granule of sand, it's hard to decipher one thing from the next. everything is wet. everything is saturated. everything is hurt, and ache, and stabbing pain. you can't breathe and at the same time your chest is on fire. there's an entire fucking ocean holding you down. i apparently have ocd. not so much the c part - not a lot of compulsion... unless it's sex... or spending... or starving myself... or over exercising and counting calories. lots of obsessive thoughts. turns out it's not suicidal ideation... or it is? but it's from ocd. anyway, now that they've changed my meds it helps with the suicidal thoughts... but i can hear everything else again and all of that just makes me want to die so i'm not sure it helps? baby's first journal/writing in a long while. i missed the solace of words. you ruined that
i started a new job at a bank. it's not the worst thing i've ever done and i like my coworkers. it's not horribly stressful and the learning curve isn't super steep.
but they're already talking about the possibility of promoting me which is terrifying. it would come with more responsibility and i feel like i can only manage myself at this point and not others.
while i am flattered that they think i'm a human and capable of doing these things, i don't know how to respectfully decline. so i just nodded and smiled.
maybe i'll be shit at sales and they can like realize i'm not worth promoting.
i'm still waiting on disability in the meanwhile.