At 18 I was prodded for an ultra sound
Warned the technician
Be gentle
Nothing had entered me of that size
See I was virgin
This was the closest to sex I had come
Held my breath as they told me relax
Wondered where I had to go to find relaxation
on the screen
I saw lines and not ovaries
Thought it witchcraft
Prognosis
Abnormal lining
Prescription
Biopsy.

When they told me biopsy I thought
Further research
Didn’t know this meant
Cutting a piece of the most intimate piece of me out
When I showed up to his office he pushed it aside
Deemed it unnecessary
Not at my age
Didn’t want to put me through the pain
Prescribed 21 days of hormones, 7 of sugar case I break the habit
Called it solution.
I called myself grateful and left
Found something seductive in taking birth control though I wasn’t having sex.

But this was body treated like
like Barbie,
moving down the production...

Sometimes
I can’t look at you
and keep the tears close to me
they run without my pressing
without my pushing
they just show up
stream down this face
be it sand
we have made rivers
my bed has become an ocean
recycling this water back to me
to remind me
how the same moment
can still cause rain
how heavy clouds can’t float forever
and my
aren’t we the darkest storm to enter
these four walls?

When you leave
I pace a kitchen through blurred vision
tell myself
next time
I will bring sunshine
let you see me light
see what warmth I can bring
when I’m not falling victim to patterns
by next time
I have grown fond again of everything we once were
I’ve made you lovely
made me crazy
blamed anxiety
told myself to breathe in every moment I instead wanted to run
but did not trust my feet to take me in the right direction.

So I stood still for you
hoped maybe you’d bring...

Remember when you told yourself you’d write yourself love poems?

Can you write them now,
when rising looks less like before the sun
and more like after 10 am
a body
weening itself off of Nyquil
a mind
no longer knowing if it’s the remnants of a fever
or laziness
can you love yourself either way?

Love yourself 11 am full of nothing done
full of banana pancakes
count how
this is day three of pancakes
grab a banana that is not your own
write a mental IOU
can you love you empty fridge
love I’ll fill it tomorrow.

Love yourself then
nothing to do
see it as loving someone unconditionally
even if that someone is you.

Especially
if that someone is you.

Remember when you said you’d write yourself love poems?

Can you write them eight days into a new year
even when all of this shit already feels old.
As you watch yourself break last year’s promises
made this year’s promises...

Today I write myself love poems.

Woman
don’t be ashamed for loving someone
through betrayal
applaud yourself for
being so strong
so capable
for loving passed lies
for loving hidden eyes.

Darling
your heart grew so large
before breaking
now
cover it
in nothing.

Wear it with a sense of pride
show the world how large you can become
let them consume you
and don’t be sorry
for all of your apologies
how beautiful
to show strength in such surrender
screaming where you went wrong
it will come back to you
this cleanliness.

You my dear
have spent countless days
crying on a floor that catches your washed soul
this is loving yourself enough
to let yourself go.

How strong to say,
“I see it now,”
to say,
“I’m sorry,”
to still leave
to still give space
both yours and his.

You are the woman
he will search for in the others
my dear
how you leave impressions
so allow...

That woman
has a backbone
the strength to tell you
all the ways she withheld her love.

How you grasped for her spine
as you held her one last time
whispered, “fuck,” as you came.

See
how she always let you in
spread her legs for you
took you into a place she never let the others enter
how she took you inside
grasped your sheets
as you fucked her into pain
that spine
how you will always see her back
when you try to fuck another
how you wish you could tear it out of her
work it into them
vertebrae by vertebrae
you’ll try to build her back.

Stack pieces of her
as you pretend you weren’t the storm that tore her apart
pretend how you’ll love her whole again
fuse all of those memories into them
but watch
as they stand crooked
as they collapse quicker than her foundation ever shook
how deep she sunk her heals into
your earth.

That woman
has a backbone
strong enough to...

I know how to miss someone
better than I know how to love someone.
Know how to
say goodbye
and I really thought this was it this time
and I’m sorry.

I can create love in absence
can create love in lonely.
Know how to create love in past
how to create love in future
how to make sure they never collide
so I never create love in
now.

Know how to say no
better than yes.
And how to say
I’m sorry.

I can miss someone
so much
I imagine they’re still here
loving me
but their apparation
I love more than I ever loved
their
flesh.

Until I see them in their flesh
and am reminded
how I really know
how to miss someone.

He asks me
if the only reason I want to stick around
is so I don’t have to do something I know how to do so well?
I think
yes
and he doesn’t understand that
maybe this means
love.
Maybe this means
moving on.
Maybe this means
I know how to say goodbye...

I told him
we can only get as undone
as the zippers we pull on.

This jacket
keeping us warm
I asked that we
pull up the neckline.

The breeze will only
freeze us
when our hearts
grow cold
so please
let us not let
our hearts grow cold.

I worry
I told him
about the weather taking
him away.
About how slow breathing
and frozen heartbeats
happen to the best of them.

About how accidents
happen to the best of them.

We can never be
cautious enough
when driving in the rain.

He told me
how careful he was
I’m almost upset
this eased me.

I guess I feel better
that he checks his mirrors
when he switches lanes,
but you know
the mirrors are never big enough,
it can still disappear under you
blood still stains streets
despite all of the air bags.

Sometimes they come out of
nowhere.

I remember how she loved him
and would never take that back
but how she would
ne...

I’m trying to write like nobody is watching. Truth of the matter is, that no one IS watching, except me (unfortunately I’m a huge critic of every word that stares back from this screen). But shucks, here we go.

I just finished Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic. All about creativity, heavily focused on writing (which I love dearly), though I tried to morph everything as if she was talking to me about Choice. She wasn’t. But let’s pretend.

Instead of talking about the he, said, she said (let’s be straight she said it, and someone likely said it before her), let’s just talk about it. The thing that was said, those multiple things. Fucking anything to get me to transform my relationship with Choice. ANYTHING.

The amount of times I said it’s my baby, and the amount of times other people said, it’s your baby, are innumerable. Then this concept visited me, from a book that I read…...

You’ve wrapped yourself around my mind. I look back at the things I wrote, confidence in letting you go because, I knew, I knew, that I couldn’t keep moving forward. So you walked me to my car, bags in our hands, and my pillow that held your head for weeks. My tears and heaving breaths, my uncertainty. That oh shit moment, did I fuck up? “No,” you said, “You did nothing wrong.”

So is this what right feels like?

I think about you when I close my eyes in a cold bed, with ice feet. I think about you rolling over and holding onto me. Your oven of a body warming my extremities. Breathing on my neck. How I hated that, how I miss that now.

Last night I remembered that phone call in Thailand. We were so fresh. My anxiety was so high. I couldn’t believe that I traveled halfway across the world for a week. You told me if you were me you would extend it, even though a part of you...

This is my apology letter
to a body
that always knew better.

I’m sorry.

I rarely heard you cries
for help
for rest
for warm-ups
or for stretches.

I’m sorry.

We both know I heard you then
but my mind
has always contained the
louder voice.

Funny isn’t it?

I learned to
quite both down.

To keep my mind
within
a skull
to keep my words
behind sealed lips.
I took it to the pavement
see I didn’t know better
I didn’t know
that trauma could build-up
in my runner’s hips.

I’m sorry.

I heard your screams
long before
I took the time to listen.

Athlete’s mentality
paired with
a stubborn personality
it wasn’t until I could barely walk
not until steps out of bed
brought excruciating pain
that I decided it was time
that we talk.

There may have been a sigh of relief
on your end
but it was muffled by sobs
Xrays
and MRIs
telling me
I could no longer pretend.

...