Trance

Had you ripped 

my heart completely out 


I guess it wouldn't 

have 
been so bad


But you made sure 


to leave it half way in 


so I could feel it all

Someday I Will Stop Being Young

Someday I will stop being young and getting stupid tattoos. There are 4 people in my house. We each have different personalities. I cut my hair over the bathroom sink with old scissors and everything I own smells of coffee shops or fresh lavender. 

There is a banner on my side that says ”Make Art Not War" and there's a confederate flag on the opposite wall that doesn't belong to me. We sit around the kitchen floor with our socks on and argue about the compost pile and Karl Marx and the necessity of violence when The Rev comes. Whatever the fuck The Rev means.
 

Every time my best friend laughs I want to grab him by the shoulders and shout “Grow old with me and never kiss me on the mouth!” I want us to spend the next 80 years together eating Doritos and taking night drives. I want to be Oscar the Grouch. I want him and his girlfriend to be Bert and Ernie. I want us to live on Sesame Street and I will park my trash can on their front stoop and we will be friends every day. If I ever seem grouchy it’s just because I am a little afraid of all that fun.


There is a river running through this city I know as well as my own name. It’s the first place I’ve ever called home besides a few people's arms. Somedays I think I'm on the Truman Show and everyone is part of some cosmic joke. I don’t think its poetry to say I’m in love with the rain. I don’t think it’s poetry to say I’m in love with the knots of your hair. I don’t think it’s blasphemy to say that certain clouds look like Jesus.
 I think secrets need to be kept in shoeboxes and that some letters are never supposed to be sent.

There is always wine asking to be slurped on front porches.
 There are always crushed packs of those candy stick cigarettes in my back pockets. I have been wearing the same patterned shorts and listening to the same 5 minute and 27 second song for 10 days
. Someday I will stop being young and getting stupid tattoos.