For the one that doesn't exist

We are sitting in our backyard. I reach over and touch the cornerstone of my home. I don't need words here, I don't need actions.

I have too many memories, that's why I don't like to think. When I think, I wonder why we let children get old and learn things we once hid from them. I wonder what the point is of knowing when I don't really want to know.

But I don't have to worry about that here. We're in the shade of two mulberry trees on a hot summer day in the Bermuda grass. I'm happy about what I don't know. I'm happy because knowing it would keep me away from you.

I come back to reality. Here, where you don't exist. Everyday, hidden behind every interaction, I am pouring libations on your grave that you might speak to me, I am building you an altar.

so sick and tired of all these pictures of me

todays the day
everybody, be an asshole to me today
please.
i want it all at the same time
altogether now
maybe i can take it better if i see you for who you are
all on the same day
all at once
and then tommorrow i won't be your friend anymore
i won't look at you
i won't talk to you
and i'll be utterly alone

but that's still better than just waiting for it to spring on me
waiting and hoping that things will be okay
that maybe there is someone like me
someone who gives second and third chances
leaves room for growth
but no one grows here
only me, growing into a contorted shape
i am misshapen on the inside
to make room for the change you never make
and all the room you take up in my conscience
i space myself out and cut holes through my chest
you walk on bits of me
and dont ever look up at others
no wonder you dont like me
you can hardly see me as i hold myself apart to make room for you

sometimes it makes me angry, but this is the life i have chosen right.
so be an asshole today
please please please please

Giving up the gun

I'm getting to the point where I'm losing my voice and settling into the complacency of knowing that my thoughts only matter to me.

My thoughts encompass myself- my feelings, my ideals, my social consciousness. Everything that matters. But they're nothing to most everyone. Even the people who say they care about me refuse to listen.

I try and pull them in and whisper the things I hide away in their ears. But they are deaf and blind to me. They shoo me away. They babble all the time. They are so caught up in the day to day. They do not know me at all.

Instead of showing me I am worth something by listening when I try to share a tiny piece of myself, they force an image on me. They throw out adjectives: sweet, funny, mellow. You can't see the way these words are like chains. They hold me down in a confined space. Stepping out of that tiny room you put me in creates an uproar. "Angela, you're never like that, this isn't like you."

You don't know how alone I feel most of the time. Alone in this room you made for me. Each room is different, but they're all just as small.

When I do something wrong, there's no pardon, only reprimand. I have to say I'm sorry for not being in my box, the way you like it. But you never say you're sorry for putting me in there.

I want to be really obscure and hide in a cubby hole of music

I'm tired of trying to be anything to anybody. I just want to sit and listen to music. I just want to hide myself behind a wall of lyrics you don't understand and compositions that aren't easily accessible and enjoy something that you probably don't or can't. I only want to feel close to the people who listen to Girls and know what I'm referencing when I say "ashes grammar- ashes maths" without googling it; people who can sing every single word to 1901.

I want the words to speak for me, and I just want to live in a place where I don't ever have to do anything but throw out a single lyric, and be completely understood.

The Fourth of July

You are making these walls. You are building them out of the words we say, and hiding in a fort of our vulgarities. The injection of our words has not made you better, but they have made you immune. You are a product of abuse. You are as hard as a bone where it was broken; you won’t break in the same place again.

You try to hide the bruises behind your ear. You’re looking for someone to love. I don’t have to look far to see who taught you that sharp tongue, and that critical eye. I don’t have to wait long before they come out. Anything good we say, anything at all, doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter because we say bad things too. You are consistent, unlike us. You constantly outpour the trash we fill you up with. It’s like those pictures of landfills we like to ignore. We keep making more and more trash each day. And you are here as a reminder of the cost of our transgressions, you show us how ugly we can be. You are showing me a reflection I don’t want to see.

Sometimes I Still Need You

Sometimes at night you're in my room. When I'm alone, and no one is online, you lay in my bed and make that face.

It makes me reach out and cup your invisible cheek in my hand, and stroke your skin while I cry and remember what I lost.

Tonight I was walking up the hill, and I swear you were right behind me, coming up from last summer, meeting me from the train tracks after we fought. You were right there.

I lay in my bed and remember the words you used to say. I listen to the Ukrainian closely. I look at red Van's in the store window. I hid your key away.

I take the bus to you. We go to Fatburger. We look for Phoenix. We drive to Portland. We fight. We lay in bed. I slap you. You walk away. I sit on the sidewalk and cry until you don't leave me anymore. I promise you. You promise me. We're okay. We're traveling, listening to NPR, listening to music. I sit with you in the gym. We look for Risk. I'm running after you. I'm yelling at you in the street downtown. We're on the monorail. We're getting Mexican food. We're in our separate hotel rooms. We are sitting on a bench in Kirkland, we are playing checkers with twigs.

I wonder what we will do tomorrow.