fluidly:

shut up shut it up we try to cut it out but its shrieking beats a bass with broken dials and no control no control — we cannot let ourselves be whole, you see: sparrow pecking holes in bed sheets   opening its beak to bleed out tired songs and kissing human skin to get along with all the filth inside. we try to keep it still and we try to keep it quiet but the world does not breathe for sparrow the world does not breathe for sparrow and sparrow can’t abide it.

+

- 

i want fatigue from dancing out of all my years of sleeping
and i want my ribs unknotted to pour my heart from out its cage i want
forgetfulness, a loud grin and thickened skin but
thin enough to feel sunshine or 

i want my life like moonshine
white lightning, i want this short and dangerous
because truth is i’m sick of living

and death is more forgiving
than the wild mess of hope 

please

corrode
away

there’s just one step from the finish line
just one push from the finish line

please

corrode
away

you rasp
 in
and out
the hours lapse, they
could not find your mind
inside the maze

but

they found your suit of skin
with (tired) vitals, 
presumed the whole of you alive

and walked triumphantly
away

fluidly:

you carry silence now, stitch-lipped and still, bled dry and thinned out
your body falls to numbness when they touch you yet

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you tried to scream until your lungs collapsed today
to give yourself concussions in twelve or thirteen different places
and you
think you bled a lot, but not enough
not enough
and this is not enough for you
but the world is too much for you ; mar your skin, beg the stars
to sweeten on your tongue. but rung to rung the climb’s too high and the stars don’t give a shit.

live or thrive or fail and die you can’t expel the devil
from your weak and shaking insides —

the devil’s been inside you
and the devil’s still inside you
and so the stars and gods see demons
where there might’ve been a human being —

blisters on your skin and tongue,
you’re done you’re done you have been done
but your head and heart still fall apart
you’ll never be done bleeding

we weren’t children after death
already sick at five and six,
burning bulbs 
breaking
in our lungs
like fireworks
or gunshots;

we sold bouquets of dandelions
obnoxious yellow pools with sticky stems
you were charismatic even then
and
   fever-breathed,

at eleven i was coke
and at twelve you were my heroin—
when we held each other close
while we tied each other’s nooses
you drew blood from all the bruises on me, 
you drew blood
you drew love
you drew blood and love from me—
i learned something about people, then

    if i’m destroyed, i can’t destroy
    if you destroy, you cannot self-destruct

fluidly:

we catch midnights in our throat
  communication veils strained and pale
with the spirit of the stairway hanging on “goodbye,”
(one last time, we promise)
maps of rust and faded braille
 cry collapse and cry
with memories of thieves and strangers
 all people are just passerby 

scales swallowing your heart
while sandbags fill the veins inside you
like the litter in the rivers of the long, broad amazon;
you are the amazon, but your body
cannot move that way, it doesn’t
move enough for someone who is trapped —

take your pills  
no

take your pills
no

take your pills
no

three hundred is the charm, or at least you’re hoping, because the morphine is so heavy in your head.