Hero.

I'm five years old,
I'm sitting on my grandfathers lap and starring up into his glasses, as if his blue eyes were crystal balls.
He asked me, "Who is your hero?"
And I say, "My daddy."
I'm ten years old,
I'm sitting behind a rusty iron desk tapping my pen & raking my brain for what I want for lunch.
The prompt askes, "Who is your hero?"
And I say, "American soldiers. Defense, in general. Firefighters. Doctors. Legal people. People who defend. Like my dad, he always defends me."
I'm eighteen years old,
I'm lying in bed wrapped in the comfort of the surrounding silence & writing shitty poetry,
The next lines begs the question, "Who is your hero?"
And I say, "Who is my hero? What a stupid question."
Who is my hero?
See, with age that has worn my heart & already given me pre middle aged lines of anxiety,
I have learned all too well that I don't exactly have someone as my hero.
I can no longer sit here in my ignorant, optimistic view drowning in my white privilege and looking to the sharks in suits & monsters with guns to be my protectors.
Even more I can no longer even stand the idea that a man who gave me 50% of my being could be my hero.
Do you remember, hero, when you'd tuck me in at night?
You see you'd kiss my forehead and read me fairytales of knights and dragons and say "Goodnight, princess."
Well I always thought you were like a knight, my hero.
It wasn't until you breathed the fire of "We don't watch the same movies or listen to the same music, so we can't be together" that I realized you were the dragon.
Still right now I am far from sitting on a throne of genuine laughter and believing in the beauty of a morning.
Still right now I am so wrapped up in fear of betrayal and loss of trust that I can't genuinely ever motivate myself to seek a prince charming.
Still right now I am constantly picking up the debris of walls of a home you burnt down.
When you slept next to that other woman did you tuck her in?
Did you call her princess?
Did you find some appreciation in your motel sheets and missed calls from home?
Perhaps, my hero, you'd remember when I was thirteen and you pushed me against a wall?
Those were the first days that depression filled my lungs with breath and you didn't understand the balance of a normal young girls hormones.
So when I met you with subtle disrespect you met me with blaring police sirens echoing from your throat, your saliva flung to my flushed cheeks, and I felt my legs shake like they did when I was checking the scale every night and you watched TV clueless.
Everytime a man I loved yelled at me all I could hear was your voice.
Everytime my legs shake from fear I remember you pointing into my chest.
Everytime I remember when I first started to not be okay I think of the haze over your eyes when you're angry.
When she told you she was staying with her husband did you push her into a wall?
Did you yell at her as if she was a dog?
Did you feel comfortable speaking with thorns in your throat and no roses growing from your words?
Oh, but my hero you couldn't remember when I was crying on my mothers bed, searching through a plastic bag of books and cards and receipts.
You couldn't even begin to understand why I never want to wear a Tiffany's necklace in my life,
The pain I felt having to uncover who the "T" was that signed her letters I love you and google her name,
The strength it took not to call your boss and get you both fired.
You will never understand how robbed I feel from your cheapskate selfish self for the length of my entire short lived life,
How hard it is to see my mother so heartbroken and have to be strong for her when I'm dying to break down,
How pathetic and twisted of a human being you are and how you will always be the definition of a coward to me.
You made me fear love. You made me fear trust. You made me fear men.
So you know what?
I don't need you to be my hero.
My hero is the ability to wake up in the morning and go on with my day,
The capacity to block out all of the shit in the world we live in and just live moment by moment,
The potential to sit down for a family meal once a month and know you're fortunate.
My hero is the fight in me that just keeps kicking no matter how many times I long to give up,
My hero is the hard and grueling yet feasible capability I obtain of giving and recieving love.
My hero is the relationship I have developed with my very best friend and the most beautiful human being I know, your ex wife.
You are not my hero. I am my own hero.

Taking, trying, saying, changing.

Here's to a very high and healthy amount of happiness hormone levels this evening :)

I decided that I wanted to know what it felt like to be “normal.”

I wanted to understand what it felt like to wake up hopeful or

have one night where I didn't wake up wondering why I was still here.

So I take a pill.

Take a breath.

Take a sip.

Take a step back.

Take a look in the mirror.

Hope the serotonin levels in my body instantly climb my bones to find a home in my arteries and nerve endings.

Hope I can look past invisible scars carved on my face to find one beautiful thing about myself.

Hope I can chain up the thoughts of a foreign figure that can’t leave my brain for one single day.

So I try to be positive.

Try to find things to look forward to.

Try to meditate my mind and relax my body.

Try to be thankful for the gifts life’s given me.

Try to force myself to smile and eat.

Hope that I won’t see pictures of my father so my lips might forget how to say his name.

Hope that something bad might happen and I may not collapse by weights of frustration pressing down on my shoulders.

Hope that someone will ask me “How are you?” and read through the lies of my flushed skin and grit teeth.

So I say no to the shortcuts.

No to different pain to mask what I’m feeling now.

No to talking to people that will only hurt me or the people I care about.

No to making my grief somebody elses.

No to finding happiness in sweat and poison.

Hope that I can continue to control temptation that’s as alien to me as the way his door knob felt in my palm.

Hope to find gratitude in my self that I've been clinging to XY's to fill me with the past four years.

Hope to learn how to stop being such a screw up.

So I change my mindset.

Change the time my alarm clock serenades to me “A Land of Opportunity”

Change the normalcy of my fingers in texting out someone's name and good morning.

Change the pattern my stomach has become familiar to with eating.

Change the way I used to always allow negativity to trump a portrayal of bare teeth exposed.

Hope that I tell my fight or flight response that nothing is chasing me and I can stop and breathe.

Hope that I can walk to class by myself and that those three minutes don’t fill me with loneliness.

Hope that I learn how to say the word love without wanting to cry.

So I am here.

Taking, trying, saying, changing.

I say I love you, Brooklyn.

It’s unfamiliar not to hear an I love you too from a deeper voice inches above me.

It’s weird to think that somewhere deep inside some honesty has built a nest in those words.

It’s invigorating trying to control your life instead of letting chemicals and tears and fear control it for you.

Because I am tired of being helpless.

I am tired of being sad.

I am tired of being scared.

So I am here.

Taking, trying, saying, changing.

For now, I hope that’s enough.

For now, I hope I stay so driven.

For now, I hope that I can keep hope.
Is this normal yet?
Am I normal yet?
So I am here.
Taking, trying, saying, changing.
It's not normal to lose four father figures in one year.
So I am here.
Taking, trying, saying, changing.
It's not normal to be so scared and so desperate.
So I am here.
Taking, trying, saying, changing.
It's not normal to want so damn badly to be normal.
So I am here.
Taking, trying, saying, changing.
I don't need to be normal. I just need to be happy.

love thyself and speak out.

You know, I wanted to stop putting my pen to paper because of you.
I no longer had the urge to make parallels or metaphors of broken hearts to broken bones.
I was done with pouring my vulnerability and anger and pure, unadulterated sadness into something so beautiful.
I stopped writing poetry for you.
But now as I look at these yellow lines once vacant and now filled by letters and tears I have realized something.
Your word is no longer shackling me to anything.
I am no longer going to censor myself to spare your feelings.
I love you, that's true.
I care about you, also true.
I never want to hurt you, undoubtedly true.
But I also need to worry about myself.
I am choosing to stop basing my self worth on your hollow glances or sugar drooping words.
I need to start loving the way the sunshine chooses to cast a spotlight on me,
the way my eyes sparkle when I'm performing,
the way my legs fall from under me when I'm nervous or high on laughter and chocolate chips.
I need to choose to love every imperfection on my pale, average, confused body.
To choose to accept the way I hyperventilate and sweat and pant when the stress is thicker than the blood that runs through my veins or I'm crying so hard from a broken heart I don't want to stop to take a life altering breath.
To choose to cherish every smile through tears, every valley that leads to a peak, every good day followed by a bad night.
I am choosing to say, "Fuck expectations and wasted words. You are beautiful and there is no single person in the world like you. That's pretty fucking special."
Love is the prettiest form of expression in the world to me.
 But instead of basing my view of the allure of life off of your love for me, I'm going to base it off my love for myself.
Because you know what, I fucking deserved to be loved.
I deserve to have an actual best friend.
I deserve to not be defined by the chemicals in my brain or a doctors diagnosis.
I deserve to not be afraid to kiss someone or look in the mirror.
I deserve to not be nervous to have someone put their hand on my thigh.
And I deserve to know what it's like to truly be happy with who I am.
I loved you so hard I forgot what it was like to actually love myself.
Well, why on Earth would I give broken promises the satisfaction of red lines and teeth grinding stings?
Why would I steal a metal flower from my kitchen to fulfill all of your empty words?
Why would I allow a hammered out broken heart to break more by faulty band aids?
I am not my depression.
I am no one's  fucked up perception of me.
I am not the trust I gave you every time I called you crying.
I am ready to feel worthy.
I am ready to feel sufficient.
I am ready to feel magical.
And I can't keep depending on your temporary healing apologies or random chocolate covered small talk to make me feel special that day.
So here's to my first love.
Making me realize how absolutely exhilarating it is to fall in love.
How earth shattering it is to be lied to or deceived or manipulated.
How incredibly difficult it is to transition from the love of your life to a friend.
Here's to my best friend.
For begging me to look in the mirror and cherish the unfamiliar reflection of fear.
For forcing me kindly to let sores heal and keep me from making new ones.
For wanting so much for me to believe in myself half as much as I believed in the tenacity of your heart.
Here's to my current....?
I don't know what you are.
I don't know who I am.
But I do know I need to attempt to fill part of the gap in my heart that was filled by you with pats on my own back, kisses in the mirror, and a little self appreciation.
I'm ready to be dependent on myself.
I'm ready to be fulfilled by myself.
I'm ready to do whatever the fuck I want, and look good as hell while doing it.

Alternate language.

Today I finally started to understand the language you live by.
I decoded your dictionary and found this:
Sad means manipulable.
Love means lust.
Confused means take advantage.
Trust means convenience.
I am stuck in this in between.
See now, at 1:27 PM, I would typically be riding in your passenger seat with your hand on my thigh.
So to me it feels natural that I should be talking to you, my thumbs long to type your name out.
But what to say?
Hi.
Hello.
I love you.
I hate you.
I miss you.
Fuck you.
Can we be friends now?
Do I want to be friends?
Do I even want to be anywhere near you?
Are my organs turning inside because they can't stand to be in the same vicinity as yours?
Do they crave for the school to peel into two and spread like the red sea so I can be farther from you?
Because I have never felt farther from you.
I have never been so confused by you.
See to me, you are the epitome of a best friend.
You are husband material, you are sloppy watermelon juice laughter, sky blue hellos, soccer mom support, compassion so true as crimson as blood on a rose.
But you are beer bottle screams, you are headboard punches, you are thunderstorms of shame and pain.
You loved me like America loved Marilyn.
You put my judgment of my own self worth under a magnifying glass and told the gremlins in my mind "Stop. Look at yourself, you're being ridiculous. You are remarkable."
You took my purity and innocence on midnight neighborhood adventures and showed them the crooks of church parking lots and Texas highways.
You were the reason I locked up metal and cut my nails and sewed my lips together to conceal my teeth to flesh.
You raised hell for a kiss goodnight or blue hearted tied words or fingertip grazes.
Now, here we are.
I lie here. Pissed. Defenseless. Hurt. Confused. Frustrated beyond belief.
I am begging the Universe to send nothings and somethings and everythings to your tall, lengthy, misunderstood and misguided self, just to curl the ends of your mouth and dry your eyes and ice your wrists.
I am praying to some being who I don't even know exists to protect your fragile, cracked, wary heart.
My kidney jumps everytime my phone vibrates and my eyes are torn between hope for and against your elongated name to appear.
I have changed your picture.
I have changed your tone.
I have changed the music you used to sing to me of bruises and lines.
My eyes share a similar confusion to that of my heart.
Because to be honest, I don't know who the fucking love of my life is.
I don't know who you are.
Because all I see is a contradictory coward who lied to himself and me out of panic.
All I see is a man who made up his mind and still played bridge with my body as his deck of cards.
All I see is an unfamiliar and foreign figure trying to hold my hands after telling me that I made him unhealthy for two tears.
Now how the fuck am I ever supposed to try to love someone ever again with that fear in my mind?
Is this true? Because even through your anger coated esophagus apologies and denial I still find some honesty seeping from your words.
Am I truly that toxic?
I am so sorry I was given the gift of misery.
I am so sorry that anxiety attacks have became a regular aspect of my week.
I am so sorry I fell broken hearted by the man who gave me his genes and the person mimicking my movements in the mirror.
I am so sorry that my consistent seek for your approval and surprising gestures and little tries just to make you chuckle were over consumed by the pace of my breath or the scars on my ankles.
But I tried. I worked. I loved. I did absolutely everything I fucking could to be the light of your life and the wonder woman of your own pristine fucked up paradise.
So I don't know.
I don't know where to go from here. I don't know whether to be pissed or get over the fact that after three years I only got one birthday present, that you never sized my promise ring, that you broke your word, your promise, your swears made upon the lightening in my stormy night sky.
I don't know whether to be pissed at you or myself that I feel grimy, ashamed, dirty with my own body because of tainted words and cameras and jaws.
I don't know whether to scream or cry because you broke my heart and left me a wreck and you still texted me seeking my comfort when I am exploding or that you apologized that I didn't change your mind when I never asked to see your name, read in your voice, cry for your pain, or in any form try to change you mind.
Damage is done.
But it is so hard to think about losing you.
I am looking forward to a friendship of complications that will always be us but I don't know how to be your friend, I don't know how to start, and I don't know whether to wait around for you to figure out who you are or adjust to this new selfish, hypocritical, weakling for my best friend.
Still, as I sit here translating English to your dictionary, I wonder, what does the word friend mean to you?
Because to me all it means is
Guarded.
Scared.
And confused.

"Probably. I love you."

The innocent crave to remain breathing ignorance for oxygen.
But you see, I am not one of the innocent.
I am not ignorant.
I am not blind or dumb or an average daily victim to being used.
But how I fell weak by the grasp of your palm, how the gears in my brain stopped turning by your reassuring words.
"Probably. I love you."
I let you seep your sad, hollow, discontented and dishonest soul into mine.
I let you allow chemicals in my body to swirl and rekindle with the familiarity of yours.
I let you grab my skin as if it were the fur of a dog, kiss my lips as if I actually meant something, bring me physical pain because what I thought the outcome would be was far more fleeting than a lapse of pink turned to red and ice-healing soreness.
"Probably. I love you."
You told me it was okay.
You told me I was so beautiful or hot or sexy.
You told me "God, I love you."
And fuck, aren't I such an idiot for believing in you.
Aren't I so fucking stupid for thinking things may actually work out.
Aren't I so horrifyingly ignorant to truly trust you.
God it seems as if my trust meant nothing to you.  My trust was the dog shit on the bottom of your shoe, the slam shut of the backdoor after a fight, the bags under your eyes resulting from a late night adventure.
"Probably. I love you."
In a state of anger and fear you allowed yourself to think from the south and not with your beautiful heart or crazy incredible brain.
You penetrated my morals with temptation and promises of a better tomorrow.
Because of all of this shit:
I am damaged.
I am broken.
I am struggling for breath.
I am struggling to eat.
I am struggling to cope with the idea that the knot in my stomach will continue to remain entangled.
"Probably. I love you."
I never knew to this extent what it felt like to be used.
I never understood the pressure that could come collapsing down onto me, because you have never felt heavier.
The primal urge is no excuse to feed on the weak and drink their body away.
I feel my skin fading and my being has become overturned by shame.
Because to you, I was just a body. 
To you, I was just a doll. 
To you, I was just a way to get what you wanted. 
But now that you don't want me you string me out on country laundry lines. 
The clothespin security of surrounding sheets and pillowcases only make me more remember the unbearable pain.
"Probably. I love you."
Well you know what, I fucking loved you.
I fucking do love you.
But my love is as meaningful to you as your broken promises and blue sapphires sitting on the bottom of my purse.
Because now, I don't owe you comfort.
Now, I don't owe you sympathy.
Now, I don't owe you advice.
Yet I continue to be there for you like a dog to a master but you are not my master.
I am burning up in the external hell you have sent me to.
I am starving from my fast away from happiness.
I am dying because your words only betray me more with each fleeting day. 
"I promise"
"Forever and Always"
"Probably. I love you."
Well, fuck your empty words.
Fuck your spoken or physical symbols of promise.
Fuck your dishonesty, your betrayal, your continuation of using and abusing my emotions and body.
Fuck that you're dying right now.
Fuck that I wish I could be there for you.
Fuck that we can't talk except for when you need my help.
Fuck the fact that my help isn't enough for you.
I am truly, truly, truly sorry I couldn't be enough for you.
That you're "Probably" mindset didn't end up working out.
That loving me just couldn't fulfill you or make your soul feel sufficient.
I'm sorry you learned from me all too well how to hate yourself.
But I am not sorry for trying to make you happy.
I am not sorry for trying to love you for as long and as hard as I could.
I am not sorry for taking risks to try to make you, and I, and us healthy.
I am not sorry that now I am seeking any possible way to smile since you stole that away for far too long.
"Probably. I love you."
Well thank you.
Thank you for letting me know that probably is not yes.
That probably is not a promise.
That probably is not forever.
That probably is not good enough.
That probably is meaningless and not a true answer.
That probably is not a reason to let your guard down, to put your heart on your sleeve, or engage in lustful encounters you thought were driven by love.

I think you are a wonderful human being. 
I hope one day you could be extremely happy. 
I loved being your everything and best friend. 
But "Probably. I love you." is not an excuse to use me because of your own selfish desires. 



Probably...... Not. But I still love you.

When love met a bruise.

I never knew what it felt like to be special,
Until I met you
I never knew what it felt like to be beautiful,
Until I met you
I never knew what it felt like to be good enough,
Until I met you
I never knew what it felt like to be hit,
Until I met you
I never knew what it felt like to be thrown,
Until I met you
I never knew what it felt like to be torn apart,
Until I met you.
I met you and my world's oceans turned to land.
Water traded his tint and free flowing personality for the stability and hardness of rock.
I met you and felt a golden coated sphere stab through my heart, the shine of a flattering exterior melting  into rough ragged reality.
I met you and I thought my midnight encounters had become my daytime truths.
I met you and I thought my poor virgin emotions had been given a gift, and maybe it was.
But when I met you, I got a black eye from getting upset too easily.
When I met you I busted my lip from genuine jealousy.
When I met you I broke the bones of trust by asking too much of you.
When I met you I received a beating for every late text, eye roll, unreciprocated kiss, or frustrated sigh.
When I met you my body turned black and blue from loving you too hard and from holding your arms too tight.
When I met you I was destined to a hospital visit  for a broken heart from contradiction and hypocrisy.
I met you and I learned your scripture was translated in fear and your God was a Coward.
I met you and realized being myself will never be sufficient.
I met you and I knew that love so true was equivalent with a death sentence.
So here I am, bloody and bruised on your kitchen floor.
Kicked the breath out of me and my soul is replaced by terror.
Slapped pink with the familiar shade of my fluttering blushing flesh.
Punched hard with mapquest guided desperation that refuses to recalculate.
I am broken by the touch of your hands and the pitch of your voice.
I am beat by clarity of the water  your crystal blue balls shed.
I am battered by your stolen whispers and tormenting screams and steering wheel punches.
I am bashed and bopped and banged by you and everything you tried to make me believe.
My body slithers along tile defenseless because you blame me for the reason of your fist's force,
My final breaths begin to shake because you aren't allowing the subtle self inflicted pain I crave.
And I crave because of you.
And you have denied my cravings.
But you see when I met you, you made it clear that my legs and stomach belonged to your being, that a comforters secrets were a priority to attachment, that your temporary portrayal of teeth could only be activated by palm sweat and eyebrow raises instead of the love in my voice.
When I met you I never knew what cuts you could kiss my shoulders with.
When I met you I never knew how hard I'd fall in love or weak on your blood stained counter.
When I met you I never knew what promises or bodies you were capable of breaking.

*****This poem is a metaphore*****

I am more.

Listen readers, for this is important. This is not a poem for another being. This is a poem for me.
I am more.
And as you read, I hope you know, sincerely, that you are more,
And you are worthy,
And you are important,
And you are absolutely, unequivocally, positively good enough.

I am more than my body.
I am more than chipped nail polish and my grandmothers ring.
I am more than entangled ivory sheets.
I am more than cracked lips and cherry ChapStick.
I am more than distant, cold kisses.
I am more than light switches and volume knobs.
I am more than that certain time of night.
I am more than passenger seats and bent over backs.
I am more than a hand grabbing my hand grabbing fabric.
I am more than lace and your uncontrollable lust.
I am more than trying to make you smile.
I am more than safe words and not nows.
I am more than a final desperate attempt.
I am more than being in the mood or it's been a bad day.
I am more than my misconceived perception of love.
I am more than please babe.
I am more than It's okay.
I am more than you're so sexy.
I am more than fuck yes.
I am more than fuck me.
I am more than sex.
I am more.
I am special.
I am beautiful.
I am unique.
I am interesting.
I am worthy.
I am worth conversation.
I am worth love.
I am worth consent.
I am sick and tired of feeling inadequate internally.
I am absolutely done with flexing my stomach in the mirror because of your harsh words.
I am infatuated with the idea of being asked if I want something.
Because guess what, world?
I am something.
I am someone.

You are someone.
And everyone deserves to be felt like they are more than pressure, desperation, or force.
We are more.


We are more.