Callie Staton

I don’t want to go deep down in there again

To dig up feelings I have long since suppressed 

And hate to admit that I have,

Because what’s left of this stupid, jumbled,

Mess of madness,

Is nothing more than charred fragments

From the ashes of yesterday’s love,

And a heartbroken young girl

So determined to better the universe with her bare hands,

That she burned alive in the flames of its sun.

I think it’s funny, how the ones who weren’t even yours to hurt you

Always seem to wind up doing the most damage.

It’s funny so long as it isn’t happening to me.

I can always look someone else in the eye, if not my own mirror,

And say “You dumbass, and you were holding out on that idiot WHY…?”

And shake my own head, and wonder how on Earth they ever managed to become so blinded By stupidity.

“But I think I love him”, they say.

Followed by“I thought I could change him” and “I thought he wanted me”.

Even though we all know, deep down,

That Romeo isn’t up crying into a stuffed moose at 3 am

Wondering why he didn’t get a call asking about his day

Or  yellow roses brought to his front door, as promised.

We all know that Romeo isn’t sitting barefoot on the couch

Watching ‘I Love Lucy’ re-runs with Ben&Jerry his only companions for the night,

Going over every possible scenario in his frazzled mind

As to why “The Question” hasn’t been popped yet.

We all know Romeo isn’t constantly checking his phone

Waiting with his eyes locked for the one he’s fallen so hard for

To send him a “I’ll pick you up in an hour. Wear a dress” text,

Instead of a stupid emoji, and a “What’s up, girl. You down to fuck?”

And we all know Romeo isn’t staring wide eyed at his ceiling late at night,

With Maybelline smudged under his eyes missing that special someone,

Longing for their presence just to be held when he cries,

Though he knows, deep down, his feelings are a wasted effort.

His special someone isn’t up, staring at their own ceiling wishing to be held,

Because God knows they wouldn’t think to shed a tear over you.

Maybe Romeo is just afraid of falling for a girl like you.

Maybe he’s just a clueless wonder

Who takes kissy-faced emojis and half-hearted emotion as genuine romance.

Maybe he doesn’t understand that dancing in the rain

And being taken out to dinner like an actual lady

Don’t have to be left for the Hallmark channel.

Maybe he doesn’t quite get it; he wants to be with you,

Yet he’s afraid, despite all your point blank hints.

He knows he wants you, and he thinks he might want to be with you.

Yet, something seems to be dragging him back, but he doesn’t want someone else to claim you either.

Or, maybe Romeo is just a stupid prick who wants to get in your pants.

And he knows just how to play you like a harp.

“You’re beautiful”, he’ll tell you, followed by some corny bullshit about the way you smile

And the way your eyes just sparkle in the sun.

Or, he’ll play the I-Just-Want-To-Get-To-Know-You card,

Or the I-Know-You’ve-Been-Hurt-In-The-Past, But-You-Can-Trust-Me,

And swear up and down that he “just isn’t like every other guy”.

Oh, but he is.

As a girl, with fragile girl self esteem, you’ll open your heart up to this guy

Because he said all the right things.

He made you feel important, desired, and cared about.

Pretty soon, you two go for a roll in the sack,

He wakes up in the morning, tells you how amazing you are and how beautiful you look without makeup

And kisses you on the forehead before leaving because you both have stank breath.

And at that moment, you just feel so important,

And you’re so sure that, whatever ‘this’ is,

Just HAS to work out now that the two of you just shared that moment.

But Romeo got what he sought after.

He goes days without a word to you,

If he so happens to see you out and about, he pretends that nothing happened

And ignores the crushed expression on your face when you beg him

To explain to you why he’s acting so weird.

Why hasn’t he made things official yet?

Aren’t you good enough for him and why can’t he claim you in public?

He’s told his friends about you, right?

And you know, in the back of your mind,

That he’ll come swooping on back in when he decides he wants more.

Enter stage right the stupid emoji texts,

The half-assed compliments and the profound ascertation that the ONE reason why things between the two of you went astray

Is because you’re just another “crazy female” and all the lovey-dovey shit he spewed from his mouth was nothing more than figments of your own wild imagination, and really didn’t mean all that you took it to mean.

Yet, as girls, with fragile girl self esteem,

We keep going back, keep holding on to a glimmer of hope

That things aren’t always doomed to end up the same, and that you, as a person, might be worth just a little bit more than to have your feelings played with.

And someday, all those boys who recklessly toyed with your feelings are going to find

That the time has come to be a man and settle down,

And when they come to stand in front of the door you locked them out of

And the heart you scratched their name from,

While they’re slumped over at your knees,

Begging you to “Baby Please” see reason, and let them back inside, (pause)

Boy, I built my walls so high, you’ll never climb back in.

I.

Bible thumpers, Donald Trumpers, Charlton Heston and his cult; Warm beer and pissing forty times a night - the way she cries when I let her down

II.

Racists and reverse racists, uneducated feminists and the men that hate the educated feminists; Little Caesars pizza and shitting forty times a night - how the sun never shines on me, even when it does.

III.

Spoon fed zombies that believe every fucking thing that’s posted on social media platforms, facebook games, and “help us travel all fifty states” posts; fuck you - you wanna travel, grey hound bus has a deal for you.

IV.

Days that never end and days that end too soon; my inability to decide on anything; because these are days i’ll never get back, even if these days are the hardest days of my life.

V.

That i cannot take your pain away. You, your pain, doesn’t matter if I know you or you know me, I’m tired of pain that polarizes our ability to see and connect to one another without hate and or rage being the caulk that binds our bones till we are fossils that tell a story to our future we never understood.

VI.

The words in my stomach, wanting so badly to be thrown against the wall of reality … yet i know, there is no time nor understanding for the things I think or feel and for that

calliestaton

You’re The Reason I Quit Drinking

Sometimes you become so hurt, so unfeeling, so cold, and so numb that you get this sudden, overwhelming urge to rid both your memory and your heart of the pain you’re feeling; almost as if your body, soul, and mind beg of you to find a means of relieving the pain, even if your only way of attaining this, is to spew words onto a patient, waiting, blank page: word vomit.  

But in your haste to rid your being of these things,  you realize that all that hurt has been bottled up for so long, and has cut you deeper than your very core, and you don’t even know if there have been words invented yet, to describe what it feels like when shards of broken memories slice your very soul in two.

I call this the hangover effect. All it takes is one “drink”, one something to captivate your attention, completely and entirely, as nothing else in this life has before, and you’re done for.

Once you start drinking, especially if the drink is a particularly intoxicating one, you’ll always want more, even though you know it has the power to ultimately destroy you and you know you should stop. But it brings you happiness, and you never expect it to have the profound effect on you that it does. Pretty soon, you stop recalling what life was like before you took that first sip, before you found yourself drowning in this liquid happiness without even ascertaining the thought of attempting to swim. You have become an alcoholic, blinded by your need for happiness, and it blinds you. It causes you to act, think, and speak irrationally and do things you normally wouldn’t dream of doing; sharing thoughts, feelings, and distant memories you shoved deep into those cobweb-filled corners of your mind. It causes you to think only of it, your automatic response is to associate happiness with it, and to push other aspects of life away in the name of it. This drink looks good, it smells good, and it’s oh so inviting. It begs for your company, it tastes so good on your parched lips, and begs to draw you close. It intices a confidence in you and awakens an inner beauty you didn’t know you had. Your eyes are bright when you look in the mirror, your hair a tangled mess; you’re having too much fun. This has been my experience with love.