Poems
Acetylene Poems
lately i wake up with stale acetylene in my throat,
out of breath and everything else too.
i make wordless vessels mumble my curriculum vitae
of not breathing. stitched lips,
draped in a jaw, clenched and stiff with guilt.
my room …
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Boisterous Emptiness
emptiness so boisterous,
knives feather around it;
that’s what i fill my vases with, of course there’s a white flower
dangling on top. i lie on the floor
and trace chandeliers with broken glass,
be quiet, absolute …
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Brittle Bones
i’m a statue of ash
stitched together with stale air,
my fears snuggle up in the cracks of walls,
the ones that i paint like sour cream;
they bundle up between the crinkles
on my piled up laundry, dressed like
overdue receipts of …
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Crimson Ophelia
i’m drawing a dull headache on the walls;
noise smeared across the room.
wreaths braided with a noose -
people aren’t a pinhole out your darkness
but you don’t see that,
in the dark.
so you punch holes in people …
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empty except for _______
i’ve been hanging mismatched smithereens of life on my bones, some days
when you break open
splinters of laughter
in my gut, the emptiness
walks itself out the door.
I’m sneaking into my own body like a stray cat,
the …
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hellcat
the cat sits there
digging its claws into the linty mattress,
she drowsily dumps her head on the floor;
pinned against the knots in air -
like a dull mustard painting
waiting to be sold
in those dimly lit indie art houses;
i keep …
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hunger
hang yourself upside down till all the pieces fit in,
squeeze your thighs into an old lover’s corset.
shut it, fucking shut it okay?
press your skin against the glass and wait for it to gnarl on the grass.
I’m not making any …
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i'm worried about her
i’m worried about her
she hasn’t slept in days,
when she does,
she’s screaming about graveyards in her sleep.
when she starts talking, it’s like looking in a mirror.
i’m horrified,
i tell her;
shush …
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Janitor's Ghost
the navy robed shadow drags his drenched boots,
he cascades like a stick figure under the dome
eating itself up.
his mouth is stuffed with hardened bread,
it falls off his skin like the wall peeling itself down,
in abandoned …
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Laundry day loneliness
a crisp day neatly hangs
between summer dresses you don’t wear.
the angels in yellow
frown at your flaxen shear.
bland cereal starts staring back at your flat eyes
half a fist of sorrow passes through your ribs.
you carry the …
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Look! I'm so fucking special
look! there’s a neon train galloping in the sky;
look, it’s looking at me.
I’m so special it’s gonna run over me,
darling, you know right?
tiptoeing around burnt asphalt on highway rails,
i’m …
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Male Gaze
men close my palms with pamphlets of desirability,
all of them begin with pursed lips;
all of them end with me shrinking.
i sit by the window and cajole myself with feminist poetry,
while i let them dress me up with needles;
i say …
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Mother
here’s what I remember
there’s a troubled lady in my head,
walking up and down
all of the alleys visited only by the dead.
sixteen circles around time, with a noose,
she measures its threads like rosary beads.
epitaphs are …
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Neurotic Rot
three summers back i took a train,
i’m still looking to get off
or any preposition you’d like.
plath said its neurotic,
the way i fling myself on every crumb of desire,
and flinch at its sight.
i quietly whisper to one …
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poem, not a memoir
dearest, get my fur coat and gloves
I should like to go out and soak my head in soup.
instead I hammer it on the mailboxes stinking of elegies;
you’re dancing under the candy
floss sky in a white dress,
my eyes are stitched with …
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the exact middle
it all began in bright hysteria,
a purple syrup you swallow;
the one lovers smear on their palms-
you might as well call it
the moment sitting at the edge of a knife,
legs dangling atop fervent obsession.
all night i count the …
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tired, again
there’s a tired boy outside my window,
his face flutters with the wind;
sand waiting to be washed over by the waves.
it keeps returning, a sigh stuffed in your mouth,
with alien mannerisms you don’t follow.
sometimes tired falls …
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vaine gloire
my eyes flinch under your footsteps,
you’re stitching a doom on my fingers;
an infinite needle dips itself in my skin-
rusted with my dad’s vaine gloire.
you see, my father likes to talk about his forefathers;
quite …
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watch you watch me
watch you watch me,
flung my head off my eyeballs;
now i only exist in front of the mirror watching,
i’m screaming in the middle of the afternoon;
wrapped myself in sheets till i feel like a person again,
don’t you …
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