// A Man’s Hands//

This is a piece I wrote about 5 months ago. It wasn’t meant to be cynical - in fact, I wrote it with hope. But I’m pissed at how relevant the topic still is.

I’ve gone and painted myself into a corpse again

No blood though, blood draws attention

And eyes are not merciless

They catch you hiding gunpowder under your tongue

And they do not forgive

No blood

There is no shame in blood, and my body is shame

My body is wintered ash

Is barbed wire seesaw

My skin is purpled by my emptinesses

Do not touch me where there is nothing

We both know men’s hands are only good for excavating

Pulling bones out of rose gardens

And I know your tips are lusting for something wet

Some spine softened by charm, by sleep

By anything but time

You say you’re not him

But “trust” is delicate melting into splinters

I have nothing but splinters for you

Try and love me with my splinters in you

Try and kiss the gunpowder out of my marrow

And tell me I still taste clean

For years, I have committed myself to being a padlocked door

All lunar eclipses in my periphery

It is hard to be honest with a man’s hands

How they hover over you like question marks, like buzzards

When they think themselves halos

When boys have played with all the light in your bones

The ringing in your ears will remind you of bibles burning

Or of tequila on school nights

Or of running, even though you didn’t run then

So I’m running now

You say stop running

But I didn’t run then

And there’s still a little girl in my shadow whose first touch was a stranger

She won’t let me cradle her, but I get to hold her hand when we run

We’re just two scared rivers, she and I

One drowning in the other

Try and love me with all the loss in my smile

Tell me my body is more than a closet

Is more than that thing that guy took that other thing from

Because being with you was never a matter of feeling safe in my skin

It was feeling safe around yours

The secrets burrowed in your palms

How your laugh lines mimic wartime trenches

You say my fear has made me delusional

I say my fear has kept me safe

You say I am worthy of the best love

But the best love is still love, isn’t it?

And love is like fighting fire with your teeth

It doesn’t make sense

It just makes for a good story if you survive it

I’m not so sure I’ll survive it

Try and love me with my hope covered in doubt

Try and love me

Try and love me

I know I can’t run forever

But that doesn’t make it any easier to fall

// The New School//

accepted, yo.

still waiting on other news, but this means i will definitely be going back to school in the fall. fuck yeah.

// Be Harbor//

Today is thick,

and I’m supposed to

be Harbor.

Underneath the sand

are hollows– don’t feel safe here.

Keep your violins, boys.

Sharp the sky with farewells.

I am losing

and gunning the walls

for my secrets back.

I’m throwing lines to every faraway,

letting go as soon as they tug back

like a promise.

I am nothing

but expulsion,

having the nerve to rip at light.

I know deeply that I can’t do this.

I know deeply that I could if I wanted to.