I watch a friend
drinking his beer
there’s condensation
in his skull, it’s backing
away from his eyes
I watch my father
drink a beer, then another,
and more still
a tool to forget things,
like children or job stress
sick to my stomach
trying to be my father
but instead I’m heaving
my guts into the shitter
instead I’m fucked up
on the floor thinking of you
on repeat all day
in my Rancid tee
cigarette burns
to wake myself up
eyeliner running
from sweat or tears
anarchy is a decrepit
corpse in my heart
but I can still resist
blood still flooding
although clean of substances
punk is being locked outside
and loving it
I’ve felt a ghost
swim in my guts
her tears are lesions
in my skin
and she can never leave
the feeling’s dead
I’ll just change back
I’ve smothered her
within my skin
and she curls inside herself
she hangs around
she just won’t run
she scratches at my walls
‘til fingernails are gone
she used to be a whimper
instead of a howl
I’m slipping in
tired
weighted
sandbags tied
anchors chained to bone
something was fighting
under my skin
squirming and strangled
by muscles taut
another being yearning
for release
it’s a thing that
you couldn’t understand
to tuck yourself
under yourself
just to become
yourself
a form your hair, clothes,
bones, and parts
contradicts entirely
what is the feeling of
being consumed by ice, not fire?
how would a whisper curl
from cracked lips?
or a beauty descend
a staircase?
confusion bit venomous into
my addled sugar skull
bones scraped one another
to reach for your frayed strands of virtue
my physical nature is a stranger
laughing in my haunted house
of a love life
foaming at the mouth
foaming at the mouth
foaming at the mouth
I drip blood when no one is looking
he was the boy in the
poor as dirt catholic school
wanting to wear jumpers
instead of slacks
not understanding the gossip
and misquoting of God’s
apparent disapproval
he had played enough hide and seek
to know when to hide forever
sinking, sunken, sunk
in the think or drunk tank,
whichever has lower attendance,
pendants gracing my collarbone
taller and prone to bouts of clumsiness
that come with growth spurts
crying to myself in a bathroom
praying people are deaf,
I’m bereft of all the common laws of nature,
nomenclature hocked onto me
for being a feminine italian with his
leather shoes hiding in pleather
sniffing dry things into a wet nose
when nihilism and piss were fashion
items, flashing police lights in my
bedroom window as I’m trying to
scratch up some enlightenment
bullshitting art theory to drop-outs
spouting how bipolar disorder
is the cornerstone of a creative mind,
while mine never brought paintings
or sculptures, just a broken wrist
and some blood from a knife twist
what you think you know, you don’t
said I wouldn’t cry and I hopefully won’t
I was extending a cripple claw
to the girl swept under the rug
with her fumes to ward off predators
she declared herself ugly, fat,
stupid, and weak
while I prepped for rebuttal
she’s falling asleep to a movie
on her bed of nails as I
curl up beside and retain water
a boys hair is curled
in aerosol exhaust
teased and tussled
haphazardly
mental illness chic
some accuse his clothing
of restricting bloodflow
and his eyelashes are false
and his nails aren’t gritty
and his shoes are what some
could call “fabulous”
don’t get them started on
his walk and his tone and
his hand gestures
stigmata still raw from his last crucifixion
blood on the dresses
stashed behind normal clothes
he isn’t right in the head
he’s confused because
he was raped or
he didn’t have a father
and if you called him miss
he wouldn’t correct you
