12-25-18
The television lights up my bedroom,
I'm alright, staying here with you,
As a guest in my own palace-
These walls are so different
Now that you fill the room-
We can hang.
I catch you like a cold,
Claw your way down my lungs
With this smoke.
And I laugh it out, easy
No choke.

Lemon,
Skies of earl grey
And chasers.
I remember the cotton candy
Swimming pools,
I remember the glass falling
Hitting the ground in sheets,
On the nights that we
Weren't bound to our feet
Or anything about reality.
The peace,
The pieces.

Lampshades and phone cords,
I'm looking at the checkered flooring,
Thinking I've made some kind
Of loop back.
I read your words and I laugh,
And I find my own solitude
In the cracks,
In the questions.
I find my own answers
Inside of these lessons.
I feel as though
I have come home,
To a place I've never known,
But every piece is familiar.
The lime greens,
Beanie fiends,
Cars and substances-
Everything in need of fixing-
These winter nights
And the street lights
I remember taking note of,
As a child.
The "I need a ride
And I make pizza,
And get drunk on the weekends",
And I'm living vicariously
Through my previous concepts
Of where I should be.
Throwback jams,
Money in my wallet,
DC shoes,
MTV
And sticks of gum.
CD players,
Blackout curtains,
Limewire,
Fox clothing,
Swearing,
The internet,
Iknowyou
Youcameback

My fingers are purple,
UV stains,
White teeth
And loud music,
Nights that never simmer out
Too quietly,
Nights that stick to your shoes.
And I know it's bold
To assume it,
But the cold has me
Making all these moves
And
I know the things you don't,
Yet I know you're so saturated
In the things you spoke.

Stripes
On the walls
2011
Stripes on my clothes,
2018
The edges that have changed
In their sharpness.
I don't expect you
To understand
But my mind's a movie,
And I wonder
What the final cut
Looks like,
What that collision
Of color,
Of bodies,
Of images
Of imaginary places,
Would end up looking like.
Document my own history,
I'll dig it up a million
Times before you,
And I wonder what magic
I'll create when the carbon from my brain
Bleeds into the soil.
What else is gifted this way,
What else is to come for me?
When I don't run this systematically,
When the calculations are gone,
When I'm nothing but greenery,
And maybe a cycle of energy,
I could be anything after
I fulfill my purpose in this time frame-
Sunlight, a tree, a house cat,
The dirt over a grave,
Wires in your walls,
Oxygen.

Lay on the carpet,
Hotel dreamscape,
This is where something started,
And I don't know the details,
But if you'd save them,
I'd have more fun creating its people.
Isn't there so much that
Could truly happen,
And we step over the symbols 
Of love, of loss, of memories,
Of art, of first dates, of heartbreak.
This carpet has seen some of those,
Maybe all,
Maybe none.
And somebody can capture its importance,
So we can't walk with ignorance
To how full this whole thing is.
There's so much to fit,
In the tiny spaces
Of schedules, days, seasons, nights, hours, minutes, of passenger seats, stadiums, classrooms, parks, coffee shops,
There is an endless amount of
Life moving, never sleeping,
Always awake for somebody
To keep it.
We are gifted
With existence,
And we have no idea,
Not even the slightest,
What it really is.
Watch you talk
And give it meaning,
Watch your words,
They stick to the ceilings.

Styrofoam dreams,
End tables and trees,
Escalators and scenes,
I think I've got it down,
I'm an introspect,
And I'm only 17.
⁃ (m.m)