Love Monster

I will never forget how carefully you look at me when I'm describing 
the wreckage of who I am.
I have a exterior of strength and independence
and an interior that feels a certain neediness.
Much to my demise,
you seem to understand just the formula 
that is made solely to protect the fragile thing underneath;
Which is all of it.

I said I was busy
I was, but not in a way that most people would understand.
There is something inside of me that I've always been aware of;
a hollow core filled with all the emotions I could never let escape.
Then the day came when they found the key and I felt them all at once.
I've been lost in something scary;
My reality became nightmarish
and my mind was locked away and screaming;
my heart sobbing in the corner

Healthy?  Unhealthy?
Who knows.
I simply no longer had a choice.
In they crept;
Under my nails,
crawling beneath my skin,
forced down my throat to the pit of my stomach.
Sending me into a current too strong to control on my own.
And there you were.  
Just there.
In the one place that nobody has ever been allowed access to.

I was busy silencing irrational thoughts
I was busy calming my shattered heart.
I was busy convincing my mind that it was okay 
until it saw sunlight again.
Sometimes, this is my busy.

Don't be too quick to cuff yourself to my crazy
I'm a no-win situation
I need to be loved hard or not at all
Love,
Oh love,
it makes a monster out of me.

Thinking Over Coffee

You called me.
Your voice reeked of drama and desperation;
Even more so than usual. 
Telling me things I have no business to care about.
That was the part that was out of the ordinary for even you.
I guess we can just chalk it up to being another one of your testosterone driven attempts to wreak havoc upon my heart.
The disappointment in your voice 
at the realization that I wasn't buying was fascinating. 
And if I take a moment to admit it, satisfying, even.
Every time the story of us crosses my mind,
Little by little the importance you once held in me 
is chipped and falling away.
This morning I peeled myself away from my needy bed 
and brewed my espresso with gusto that today will be the day.
I sit watching the steam rise from my "Happily Divorced" mug 
and follow it to the intersection of hope and hopeless.
How am I supposed to forget you 
when even my morning coffee reminds me of you?
Hot and comforting.
Strong, bold, yet sweet.
Something that even I am convinced 
that I cannot get through my day without.
I might as well be squeezing 
my perpetually bleeding wound of a heart in my hands.
My nails dig in deeper and I gasp at the realization that I'm 
still waiting for the day to come where you cross my mind 
and I can't remember how long it's been since the last time.
The day that I stop worrying that I'll never be able to create art as beautiful as your curiously gentle grin.
Maybe I was selfish by begging you to pick me for once;
Just like a kid reacts when something they love 
is being taken away from them.
Bewildered that trying to make you gone from my head 
has made you even more present.
It's as if you can feel me saying goodbye to you. 
Just when I feel that I might be winning,
You seem to feel the need to reach out to prove me wrong.
I'll make you a deal:
You do the remembering for once,
While I do the forgetting for a change.
Maybe then our hearts will finally be even. 

Lust

I remember the first time I fell in love with sexuality.
I've been high off it ever since.
They carry it so casually;
As if you all have no clue my legs are threatening to give out beneath me.
I think that is what makes me so giddy.
That you have no idea how gorgeous you really are.
You are oblivious to what a girl would give to live wrapped in your eyes for just a day.
And the desire....

It's relentless.

My hands are on fire.
They ache terribly to reach out and touch
the stranger I've fallen deeply in love with.
My feet are planted firmly to the ground
And silently chastising the lesser of my being that aches to wrap myself around you.
I respect all that you are too much to pout or grovel or beg;
but to say that I was just as composed on the inside would be a flat out lie.

My heart is a graveyard.
Everything is buried in there as deeply and repressed as possible,
But when they talk about love,
I swear I feel them scratching at the back of my brain
Trying to make room for you.

I question.
I over think.
I insert fear into things that never carried any danger to begin with.
I leap off of sky scrapers built with my own mind.
Maybe this is nothing.
But what if it's everything?

So here I remain.
Planted.
Silently, painfully
Admiring the art of you, 

The stranger in the Hall.