Shallow

i run my nose along the line of your collarbone
breathing in and breathing out
with the rush of your heartbeat under my cheek
nothing trembles, but nothing breaks,
all is well inside your bone cage barrier:
please don’t die.

i see him in the chest hair i rub my face into,
and it makes me weep, it makes me ache,
that you two are so different,
but every time i feel the rough pads of your fingers
you remind me of him
and i am sad, and i am hurt, and i am confused,
and i am lost.

are you my electra complex?
or am i just another lonely orphan
searching for her family in the kindness of strangers.
if you could only please fuck me,
so you remind me nothing of the
father i crave.

this loneliness settles in my veins
you know it better than most
the thick liquid seeping from under my eyes
and fingernails
and bones
retching into empty bathroom stalls
stained with love letters:
a + s forever

but darling,
we’re not even in the present, let alone the future.

i like it when you fuck me,
eighteen syllables from polite conversation
and that same bleeding echoing in your
clenched fists and tight lips
i forgot, was this supposed to be a fight?

but you bite my thighs and tell me how
sweet i taste, like summer rain on your tongue
the storms that follow in the middle of the night
or maybe the dust that settles over everything
wet and mildewing
a + s forever, baby.

our hunger makes us vulnerable to all these half-smiles
blown kisses and backward glances
and being left here
alone
again
in this bed
my veins pulsing seething black rat vomit:
all i need is a razor blade
and no one to cry wolf.

darling, leave me in the present
i’ve got no future to give.

i am an empty bottle
but you have made me a drunk
falling over my own words
while smashing to the ground

parodies of love stories on television
if i give you eighteen kisses can i have them back,
later, when you’ve used them all up?

take me out dancing, take me to the sky,
there’s only so much sobriety i can stand
could you please fucking learn how to fly?

if this is a dance it’s a stupid one,
you and your lame left foot,
me and my inability to stay away from those
god-damn,
swaying,
gorgeous,
hips.

so take me down from the highest shelf,
dust me off, whisper a prayer,
and knock it back,
just like any other night.

lately, i have been hitting things.
i always wanted to be violent, a rebel
that kid who threw chairs in fifth grade
and was sent to the principal’s office every day.

but i was the quiet one, the knowing one,
the girl who talked to that boy and understood
why, why sometimes you need to throw things
and curse, and fight, and scream,
but never, never did.

it was there, though, under the skin, biting, itching
tearing at my internal organs, boiling out
black fluid collapsing my screams into sighs
soft words, compromise, getting it, getting it,
always god-damned getting it.

lately, i’ve been hitting things,
not seeing a real reason why, why not
why shouldn’t i swing, punch things, tear off my skin,
tell the world that i am
not
fucking
getting it.

and they get it.

let me speak vicious words
i could tear you apart
a cat, a game, a mouse:
but don’t be cliche, you were never so timid.

you can be the elephant, and i’ll be the circus
drag me through your dust and leave shit in your wake
yeah, i’m a little bit angry these days.

and it’s funny, because
i miss the feeling of your hair when you’re not around
and the stubble of your cheek,
your thoughtless half-assed glances.

or maybe i’m the bitch, swallowing dreams,
too ambitious for an artist, too apathetic for an artist
scribbling obscene words on the peace of our
sugar-coated oh-so understanding
conversations.

yes, i’m a little bit angry
that i don’t know yet how quite to scream
when every nerve inside me is rattled with energy:
did you take that from me, or did i never have it
in the first place?