Church of the Most Holy Redeemer

we are walking down second street
and talking in the two pm afternoon sun
when we notice that the doors are open

we could go in you know

you say and we
almost walk past
but we can't resist
the beckoning of silence

remember me sitting in a pew counting the number of times the holy ghost was said in the girls communion pamphlet remember easter sunday eating chocolate sticky wash my hands with holy water remember the meaning of my name remember that this culture belongs to someone remember that once the earth did not exist remember the way candles look in the darkness flickering remember when we sat by the river and talked about souls remember how i tried to fold one thousand paper cranes and the principal of my elementary school told me to write a letter instead remember how they all looked crumpled together in a paper bag in the closet remember that moonlight is like sunlight but cold remember that you are cold--

remember this right now me in
my white converse, toes pointed towards the altar
stepping

--remember it as you walk down into the train and don't look back and the closing doors are loud so fucking loud remember it when we apologize for the inconvenience but after an earlier incident this train is running with delays because of a track fire, we will (never) be moving shortly (ever again) remember this when you finally get home and its dark outside its nighttime and the cars are honking at you as you jaywalk because its not your light but this light's broken anyways and you just can't bring yourself to care remember this when its so black in your room that you stick your hand out in front of you and it dissipates remember this when your brother's firetruck goes off at one in the morning and you wish you took the batteries out or at least put it on the highest shelf above the refrigerator

remember this

silence

my best friend emma tells me
that you are not worth a dime
of my time
not a nickel a penny on the sidewalk
a golden star sticker
of my energy

it takes a certain type of person to be
able to force with words
to draw out emotions so
cunningly

i knew you so well that you did it sometimes
without even trying
stuck in a rut of manipulation
voice chords programmed to pull my strings

nine o clock on a sunday night

sometimes i think that you think
that you can erase everything
with movie scenes
its like you want to cut yourself out of your life here
and insert yourself into
books magazines
full screen cinema pictures

your words are too sappy for real life

i dont feel bad when you're an idea

but scrolling down your facebook page
i feel a little bad
seeing that you are a full fledged person

with friends

and remembering that when i see a picture of you
i can remember your mannerisms

then i feel a slight tug at the heart strings
imagine you peeking into my house
with yellow windows
outside in the darkness
imagine you peeking into my life
with yellow windows
outside in the darkness

and thinking that wow you are maybe still so
deluded as to think that you loved me
you must hate me now
and that makes me sad

but it shouldn't

everything i write is about you
(how can everything i write be about you?)
its a way of putting these moments
(these feelings)
how i feel right now
writing thinking about
you how i feel always thinking about
young love
and you and me and the way you look at me
sometimes when
we start to simultaneously cry
or gasp or wither angrily slightly
barely
a last attempt to drape these words
into a tapestry of
timelessness in internet existence
i have amassed a stronghold
of outbursts

Yellow

We had an egg
and named it yellow

sat in the white crisscross goal like
fishnet stockings
and drew with a red marker

slowly our egg
gained some hair
and a smile
a wavering hand
left a triangle nose
(hopefully not to be erased
later on)

slowly my greyness
receded between
the rays of your enthusiasm
as we listed all the names
we could think of
Pace
you suggested
then remembered
that you didn't really like it that much
Milo?
received a resounding no
we searched for girls
names but to no avail

moved on to other things
the color of the room
was quickly decided
we looked down looked up
yellow
simultaneously

one decision we could make in unison
scrambling for a piece of wood to knock on

later on
when i caught you after fifth period
you unzipped a compartment of
your backpack slowly
guilt ridden eyes searching
my expression for a sign of
anger ebbing and flowing
beneath my skin

i shouted with mock horror
as i saw the splintered shell
realized the fate
of our third period project
then kissed you softly
and you knew you were forgiven

(our skin
is harder than
our egg cased child
fractures less easily
even as we are thrown
and fail to be
caught)

these silver spheres
are not for me
hard topped pitter patter
under my wavering hands

the cool curve of the
snare
rips my ear drums violently
and i want it to do it again and again and again

when you finally look up at me
and tell me to break
my ears are ringing

they do not stop when we sit and talk
they do not stop when we go upstairs

we lay down listen to music
and by the time the shaking has stopped
i am hungry for more

i can't explain
how much i love
reading other people's
poems

(poetry as a blanket that
we wrap around ourselves
that drapes our
lives in fog)

the joy
i
feel

in the revelation of others

makes me see everyone
in a better light

"I'm not going to lose you over something this stupid"

i come back
and squeeze you
so hard that you
comment

this time apart
has given me perspective

an hour doodling our memories
in a bright bustling coffee shop
brings me back into
the world

the things that make me happy
are so simple

we are so afraid of the worlds that other
people have when we have lost
our own

despair in one moment
glee in another

today you sat across from me
and i wanted to believe your words
and i wanted to see our futures
as we placed ourselves
in the years that come together

we could do it you know

and i feel my back hard against this marble

its not advisable
but we could do it

the pink in your face is so beautiful and your shirt
and your eyes so eager and your skin
so much skin and i try to remember why 24 hours
ago i was trying to list the reasons and justify to myself
why we should be apart when the answer
is in this beautiful garden next to the hudson river
and suddenly my head is full of all these gnat
explanations i have told myself
and i am a good liar

yet here you are holding out a brightly tinted
dream here in your hands

and i know it shouldn't be able to work
to catch our eye so easily
and i know we should be harder
and i know i should be stronger
but it plays with the light so tenderly
and turns such beautiful colors
that i cannot help but invest my love
in its space

and i want these 1152 square inches to be my world

nonsense

i have not written poetry in quite a while

at least not like this
emptying myself out
like a lunchbox
a purple
backpack full of
crayons a jar full of
water and
old petals that
needs to be
washed

pouring myself out (into
a glass/i popped my first
champagne bottle the other day
and pressed my palm
against the cork
told to brace for pressure
waiting for the pop
and when it
came a shocked look
on my face/into a river
will i flow among the
souls of others, where will
you be?)

the only precious thing I own
my beating heart within my chest.
that keeps my blood alive and red
to which my life I do invest.
without I would be just a shell
a noiseless body without core,
no measured thumps to keep the beat
no life's breath in me anymore

a haikus on friendship from w+t

i.
if i was a fly
i would be solitary
i would buzz alone

on the grass (messy)

You lay with your eyes looking
up and I looked down at you

I don't know if I will get better

you say quietly
and I feel the helplessness
the uncertainty of the future
cracking our faces slightly
breaking us apart

after a pause
I speak

mindset is everything
I think
I say hesitantly
I do not like my words to step
where it is not my place

in not knowing
positive and negative become equal
which would you
choose?

Yellow Nails

I look as if I am a five-year-old
I sit on the cold grey seat
of this L turned J
train and laugh
at the telltale smudges
along my fingers

simultaneously I am
embarrassed and endeared
by myself

when I held my hands up
to your face you grunted
faint approval
but when i chastised your
lack of enthusiasm and
threatened removal
you became adamant
that I should not give up
so easily

there is something comforting
in knowing that I can walk
into this school with preschool hands
and still be a senior

my yellow tipped fingers
cannot steal my years away