charmolypi

now i am waiting for you again, right outside the midnight

so when you see hollow eyes, you’ll know the reason why

so when the storm crests and breaks over our backs, rain fallen time

maybe then we could’ve had the chance– to lie

so when i’m a whisper, right now i’m a silent scream-

but depths aren’t always hidden, nothing’s under the leaves-

so when i’m a once-forest, left only with burned trees-

promise to leave her, so that i’d have seen myself freed

so when i cling, only gray shiver of iron left behind –

so when i sob, wishing for time to rewind –

so when i cut open a space for my body to live in, 

papercuts on my skin from trying to fit in it, 

will you once again tell me why i cry?

i gather them like black susan’s and swallow them whole until they rip open

in my gut and explode until i am covered in their dark ink and shattered words

cut, to ribbons, to splinters until all i am is a agglomeration of their sloping curves

i am not a person, i am the end/i’ll wait until you catch up with me/i loved you/i love you

i am steel feathers sprouting from my arms, sentences spearing out of my long neck

and they cascade through my fingers, never to be felt the same way again

and if you take my blood under a microscope, analyze what is in truth stardust and ash

her and i were two separate pieces snapped in half, a bone-dry branch that once had pink flowers blossoming from the tips. we were fused together, molten steel with dripping silver, heavy and never old.

i laid slivers of myself at her feet until she had them all and held them in her hands, unknowing of what this was. she never asked; i let it slip through my fingers, and you might think it cascaded like thunder like water, but more like midnight like wind, like forgotten smooth skin.

i still remember the moment i chose to let go of my dignity, when i said goodbye to everything screaming 'leave it be!', when the girl came knocking and i decided 'why keep talking?', when the white walls grew too loud for me to stand and the thoughts were too shattered to comprehend, and where i always thought i'd take a stand -

there was silence, not even a whisper of wind.

so if i drive myself to the edges of a cliff, and i step back a hundred times, if i tell myself to act, and i tell myself to stop crying – does it count as a punishment? and for whatever crime?

i am a scream, i am not silent i am a shatter of noise-

i am the colors that fill in the spaces inside yours head, i am a wall of sounds that will blast

and boom and soon there will be no poise, no elegance left in this

shattered colloid, bin of broken things, bits of you and me intertwined, like the ashes of hero’s aeons past- but we are not dust.

we are vicious noise, knives sheathed in sharper things, layers of edges tucked between,

we are ruthless loving kindness, and we are the absence of quiet; of the ghostly days where your voice goes, you’d never try it-

no, we are shrieks and shouts burning into the long night, trying just once more to not say goodbye, trying another thing already tried-

we are our own answers, call and response echos among us, a whiplash, we try new alloys of brokenness, screaming who did this, right before the bomb of silence deploys-

do not mourn us when we disappear, because at least we were alight-at least we made a sound going into that good night-

something has been stolen from me.

has been ripped from my gut, ripped from my lungs

and i cannot remember how it once was. 

i am spilling over the edges, again

gold tarnishing to iron cable, holding a heavy load. 

i am burning out like a candle in the silence, again

at least i think i lasted longer than most. 

something has been taken from my ribs, 

it was essential: it will never be seen again

it had been growing, slow and hungry

i could just say i’m stressed. that i am worried about one of my friends (i can’t live if she disappears she is my favorite human being please don’t let your mind take you away). that i have friend drama with another girl (i love her i love her i love her and i could never be good enough to say that out loud). that i am stressed from school (nothing makes me feel alive anymore) and from practice (it used to be my safe place, years ago). i could just say it’s the seasonal depression, but it’s approaching like a storm of dread and i can’t move at all and  i am paralyzed in this horribleness. i looked at the weather forecast. i knew it was coming. and i stood still. 

i give away my body and i give away my brain,

slipping though my fingers slipping down the drain

my dreams are hanging in your closet, you say i can’t take the strain

i’m begging for movement, you tell me to stay

breathing on a rhythm, every second controlled

breaking down as you dither, playing with time ice-cold

metronomic in-out, i can never do as i’m told

in a glimpse, a second of you;

you are my moment after waking

when i reach back for a dream, still

in that lovely, warm, golden place

and you are the moment when i open my eyes, 

so unbearably unknown for a moment

before i remember again, 

welcome, none

the prison for dreamers is open

alligator tears drip from the edges, 

as the false people pray to a silent god

giving thanks to him for high ledges

from which to hang their own necks

welcome, prisoners

they surround cities with barbed wire

taking hostage those who are lost

look around, see the ashes of cooled fires

they thought our voice wasn’t worth the cost. 

welcome, screams of bombs

wildfires alight, knives of pain

driven into the chests of the hopeful

as they swear, one day this will bring us fame

oh, they blind us unaware to the day

welcome, roars of airplanes

murdering the american dream 

as they spirit away the dreamers, 

in the name of hearing the screams

in the name of what senseless cruelty means

welcome, fear

of loving other girls or caring about the dying 

of what is real, of not being able to tell

of humanity, because no one’s really trying

i am afraid of being too quiet here in my cushioned cell, 

and being complicit when they shoot the canons. 

welcome, none. 

this summer, my hands have no blisters from the oar

they are too calloused to break, so only splintered skin is shredded in small pieces

my palms are hardened, the pads of my fingers  yellowed from the weight

few rings fit on my thumbs now, the constant turning causing them to grow an unmovable shield

when my friends hands are torn open and apart by the waves and whitecaps, mine are built upon

theirs have stories of sharp pain in every blister, every angry red mark

yet for me, the pain simply sinks to bone and muscle

and lingers, and wraps itself through the ligaments

and intertwines with my breath,

and keeps my fingers curled lest

they might break in two.

god, what i would give to have blisters, burning and

biting just for mere minutes, on mere skin

god, what i would give to feel normally

i know, i know nothing of desperation,

but i am begging, clasping my hands together

at your feet, crying

may i please have some safety?

may i trouble you, to beg for a promise?

i cannot rest here, or there;

would you, kind stranger, disappearing savior,

invisible ephemeral love;