my purplebruised lips
so beatenswollenshut
at the insistance of
my own hands




i have been recklessly throwing myself
into everyone else so i can forget


[things i have come to accept

you are not my solution to everything
but you make the morning easier to swallow]


and switching veins
of conversation comes so naturally to me
i do my best self destruction when deflecting
reflecting
not letting you remember
that you still don't know my
name



half the time i use the word you
i really mean everyone



sometimes i let myself slip a little
put the words in the wrong(rightifiwerebeinghonest) order
and give away my secrets



i want you to know
that i don't want you to know
i want you to know




that





i deleted scores of honesty
from this little scrap of nothing
and replaced it all with compound wordtricks
so prettily falling into place
and i tell myself

that it screams with symbolism
that it doesn't hurt just me
that it's meaningful

and briefly



i let myself wish
for someone to understand it




but
i am lying

because i don't want anyone to read between the lines
i've drawn around myself
because
this is the only thing
that makes me feel good
about breathing
and i can't let you
take that away
from
me




but
i am lying

because i want the rhinestone compliments
glittering in plexiglass understanding
i want them selfishly
want to ram them sharpended into my chest

cover my heart with them
so i could feel


as beautiful





as you are











to you







*





i am good at giving everyone
the advice i'd give myself
if we were on speaking terms



i say
i am unextraordinary and
like everyone else
but in my mouth
those words are an insult




i know too many greaterthanbeauty people
i fall too short



and i cannot count myself among them





so i tell my secrets
to strangers
and breed confidence through anonymity

i won't be afraid of you
until i have loved you up
in my own bed
cast amongst my own failures

where you stand out
stark
and
naked
in the night



perhaps
you will never know


how i have torn at my mouth!
furious with its betryal
taking out my anger on unsuspecting flesh
when in ashamed actuality
it was my fingers
that did me wrong so grieviously
and i could not bear to break them
of the habit




i fail myself
more than anyone else




beyond comprehension
i linger so sullenly with my best intentions
bloodied by well-meant butchery
of even my own self

i craved
i carved out my heart
to keep you from hearing it beat
and it thuds now
caught in my throat
where you taste it when you kiss me


i am not without feeling!



and these words rage
with a screaming i've forbidden my lips to part for
a primal deathcry
strangling me from inside my lungs




and more than anything







i am afraid


no one







will know










i'm dying












----------







this hurt to write. some say it hurts to read.
elegant kiss, my sweet amyamy, wrote me a response.
go here.