For everyone who read these poems

  before they were on these pages.

  You are why this book exists.

  Contents

  Change Came to Me So Ugly Then

  We Call This Place Home

  Nothing to Close a Door

  How We Heal

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  I Stopped Going to Therapy

  Because I knew my therapist

  was right, and I wanted

  to keep being wrong.

  I wanted to keep my bad habits

  like charms on a bracelet.

  I did not want to be brave.

  I think I like my brain best

  in a bar fight with my heart.

  I think I like myself a little broken,

  with rough edges, a little harder

  to grasp. I like poetry

  better than therapy anyway.

  The poems never judge me

  for healing wrong.

  There Is the Worst

  and Then There Is More

  You silly little girl,

  you think

  you’ve survived so long

  survival shouldn’t hurt anymore.

  You keep trying to turn

  your body bulletproof.

  You keep trying to turn your heart

  bomb shelter.

  Stop, darling.

  You are soft and alive.

  You bruise and heal. Cherish it.

  It is what you were born to do.

  It will not be beautiful,

  but the truth never is.

  Come now,

  you promised yourself.

  You promised

  you’d live through this.

  For Those Like Me, with Hearts

  Like Kindling

  Darlings, sometimes love

  will come to you like a fire

  to a forest. When it does,

  be braver than I was.

  Just leave.

  Take only what you can carry.

  No tears, no second thoughts.

  You have hands like tinder boxes,

  the smallest spark will kill you.

  Get in the car.

  Take water to the maps.

  Avoid gas stations. Don’t look

  at the flames dancing

  in the rearview mirror.

  Go to new cities,

  climb on the rooftops and dance

  with your coldest memories.

  Wallpaper your new home

  with every dusty,

  desperate love letter you swore

  you’d never send.

  Find a stranger with sharp edges

  and uncharted hips. Press your stories

  into their skin and forget

  you ever knew his name.

  Just promise

  you won’t think of embers

  or smoke.

  Even when there is ash

  in your hair.

  Even when there is soot

  in your lungs.

  That Spring Everything Grew Wild

  and the Rain Came Down

  Like Punishment

  I sat on the fire escape

  until the ashtrays were snowdrifts,

  watching for storms on the horizon.

  Begging the world for a reason

  to lock all the doors.

  Change came to me

  so ugly then.

  Showed up alone

  with moldy suitcases

  and too many demands, speaking

  the language of hard looks

  and wine headaches.

  Telling me things I did not want

  to know, growling,

  Getting everything you ever wanted

  does not make you want less

  and

  You break the hearts

  of better people

  who get in your way.

  When will I stop belonging

  to this hungry thing inside me?

  What no one ever talks about

  is how dangerous hope can be.

  Call it forgiveness

  with teeth.

  I Pity the Woman Who

  Will Love You When I Am Done

  She will show up to your first date

  with a dustpan and broom,

  ready to pick up all the pieces

  I left you in.

  She will hear my name so often

  it will begin to dig holes in her.

  That is where doubt will grow.

  She will look at your neck,

  your thin hips, your mouth,

  wondering at the ways

  I touched you.

  Offer you her lips, her throat,

  the soft pillow of her thighs,

  a sacrifice to the altar of virtue.

  She will make you

  all the promises I did

  and some I never could.

  She will hear only the terrible stories.

  How I left you. How I lied.

  She will wonder (as I have)

  how someone as wonderful as you

  could love a sinkhole like the woman

  who came before her. Still,

  she will compete with my ghost.

  She will understand why

  you do not look in the back of closets.

  Why you are afraid of every groan

  in the cold sweat of night.

  She will know

  every corner of you

  is haunted by me.

  Medford, Oregon

  We are from a place

  like a thicket

  of blackberry bushes.

  Our home, this maze

  of green snakes. Their fangs

  an inevitability.

  They scratch. Swell. Leaving

  the most subtle kinds

  of venom. No one

  crawls out unscathed or without

  crushed mouthfuls

  of sugared fruit

  in her stained, dripping

  hand.

  I say that

  like I ever really left

  at all.

  On the Occasion of Our Anniversary

  I.

  This morning I googled

  signs of domestic abuse

  to remind myself I was right.

  I still flinch at slamming doors,

  a broken dish, a white couch.

  There are days I yell so loud

  I swear it’s your voice

  in my throat.

  II.

  I have learned

  this world is the size of a fist,

  lately an open palm. Whatever corner

  you’ve got yourself chained up,

  you will read this.

  III.

  Good.

  The Poet Finally Drops the Bullshit

  I am 15 and he is my first boyfriend. He is 18 and 6'4" and his hands are the size of thick textbooks. He says he has a lot to teach me. He is drowning in his own sadness. Drowning people often believe that if they grab hold of someone else they can be saved, but it just makes you both sink faster.

  I am 17 and she is my first girlfriend. The only thing we do more than fight is fuck each other. I tell her about the boy’s hands and she tries to stretch her fingers wide to mimic them. I say, Stop it. I say, I love you as you are.

  I am 19 and in the first of many dirty rooms with books strewn everywhere and a mattress in one corner. These rooms always belong to boys with unshaved faces and tender hearts. Boys like this are a dime a dozen, but I don’t know that yet because tonight I’m with the first one. He hands me a beer. He says he thinks I’m smart. He orders me to take off my clothes.

  I am 20 and in love with someone who lies. The punishment for telling lies is being cruel. The punishment for being cruel is being abandoned.

  I am 21 and it is not sex because I did not say yes. I say stop but that does not make it stop. I am 22 and crying because this new set of promises wants to kiss me, and I still taste like betrayal.

  Leave Her Lips

  for Some Younger, Prettier Girl

  They ruby and burn,

  stretch full over white teeth; taut

  like a drum. I want her

  to make music of me; instead

  I water plants and envy their wet.

  I wash dishes with unsteady hands.

  Leave her hands to their work.

  They are scarred with stories,

  sliding thick down her legs as I stare.

  Mouth cotton, thighs pulsing

  to the steady rhythm

  of her breath.

  If I do not play this cool, she

  could burn my house down.

  Leave my house where it stands.

  Let me have this. This crooked

  home; the only person

  who has ever promised not

  to leave me. Let me be worthy

  of the first good thing.

  I am terrified

  I will break his heart

  just because I feel restless;

  because it is between me

  and what I hunger for.

  Leave my hunger out of this.

  It is stronger than any precaution.

  My stomach drops tight

  at her voice.

  My palms itch

  for her skin.

  When she comes to me,

  the closer she gets, the more

  I want to give.

  I want



  to give her everything.

  There Is a Lion in My Living Room

  I feed it raw meat

  so it does not hurt me.

  It is a strange thing

  to nourish what could kill you

  in the hopes it does not kill you.

  We have lived like this

  for so many years.

  Sometimes it feels like

  we have always lived like this.

  Sometimes I think

  I have always been like this.

  Here Is the Bitter Truth

  That mouthful of thorns

  you called our last kiss

  still lingers

  after so many others.

  Thoughts on California

  The summer I moved to Berkeley

  in hopes of reinventing his smile,

  the grapefruit tree in our yard

  grew heavy with its own bounty.

  I’d pick the sunbaked fruits

  and split the pink flesh

  with my bare hands

  devouring it like a heart.

  That was the summer

  I wanted him to marry me so bad

  I told everyone he asked when he didn’t.

  I’m not saying that’s why I left.

  The not saying does not make it

  any quieter.

  This Year

  I’m not sure what to say about struggle except that it feels like a long, dark tunnel with no light at the end. You never notice until it’s over the ways it has changed you, and there is no going back. We struggled a lot this year. For everyone who picked a fight with life and got the shit kicked out of them: I’m proud of you for surviving.

  This year I learned that cities are beautiful from rooftops even when you’re sad and that swimming in rivers while the sun sets in July will make you feel hopeful, no matter what’s going on at home. I found out my best friend is strong enough to swing me over his shoulder like I’m weightless and run down the street while I’m squealing and kicking against his chest. I found out vegan rice milk whipped cream is delicious, especially when it’s licked off the stomach of a boy you love.

  This year I kissed too many people with broken hearts and hands like mousetraps. If I could go back and unhurt them I would. If I could go back even farther and never meet them I would do that too. I turned 21. There’s no getting around it. I’m an adult now. Navigating the world has proved harder than I expected. There were times I was reckless. In my struggle to survive I hurt others. Apologies do not make good bandages.

  I’m not sure what to say about change except that it reminds me of the Bible story with the lions’ den. But you are not named Daniel and you have not been praying, so God lets the beasts get a few deep, painful swipes at you before the morning comes and you’re pulled into the light, exhausted and cut to shit.

  The good news is you survived. The bad news is you’re hurt and no one can heal you but yourself. You just have to find a stiff drink and a clean needle before you bleed out. And then you get up. And start over.

  The Brief Two Seconds

  After You Ruin Everything

  After your grandmother’s

  wedding ring

  slides off your finger

  and down the kitchen drain.

  After your sister finally

  unlocks her mouth and tells you

  what happened the night

  you didn’t pick up the phone.

  After that party

  your freshman year of college

  when you drank all the vodka

  and threw yourself at that boy

  who was so not into you.

  After the picture frames,

  the wineglass,

  and your vows

  lay broken on the floor.

  After you drop out of college.

  After your mother tells you

  not to come home anymore.

  After you accept that your father

  and the man you love

  have the same brown sugar eyes.

  After it has been two years,

  and you’re still not sure

  you love him.

  After it has been four years,

  and you’re still not sure

  you love him.

  After he asks you to marry him,

  and you’re still not sure

  you love him.

  After you pull your underwear

  from the dark curves

  of a stranger’s sheets

  and leave

  without saying good-bye.

  After you, sobbing,

  confess what you have done,

  and he does not forgive you.

  There is shame.

  There is fear.

  And there is this dizzying

  freedom.

  All This Time

  I drank you like the cure

  when maybe

  you were the poison.

  Something is wrong.

  There are flies over the bed.

  Everything smells

  like wasted blood.

  Three-Day Weekend

  I.

  If I had a shot of tequila

  for every time I swore

  I’d never drink again,

  I’d be drowning in tequila.

  When I get drunk all I do

  is talk about you

  and kiss boys who aren’t you.

  Our teeth clacking together,

  empty bottles in a trash can.

  That is exactly

  what’s wrong with me.

  II.

  After the bars close

  we go behind the Safeway,

  climb in the dumpsters,

  and tear apart the trash bags

  like raccoons. Pawing

  through the salvageable,

  feeling fish heads squish

  under our boots.

  You find a dozen

  half-dead sunflowers

  and present them to me

  on bended knee.

  Here, you say, Finally,

  something as beautiful

  as you are.

  III.

  The drunk pillow of your body

  wraps around me

  every night.

  We built this crooked house

  with our own shaking hands.

  We call this place home.

  You Have Six Tattoos

  Full lips. Good, strong hands.

  You have seven freckles

  on your back;

  they map out the Big Dipper.

  You have a scar on your left arm

  you carved there in high school.

  The first time you pulled off

  your T-shirt, I traced the line

  with my fingers and fell in love

  with your strength.

  You are a hero for living

  from that moment to this one.

  You never need to apologize

  for how you chose to survive.

  Your body is a map

  I know every inch of,

  and if anyone else

  were to kiss me,

  all they would taste

  is your name.

  Three Tomatoes and a Mango

  I’m learning how to tell stories

  so I can tell the world your story.

  I read poems but they fall short

  of the way your hair falls across your face

  so I shut the book. You have dirty hands

  and a sugary heart and convenience store

  taste in wine. The way you say my name

 

1 2 3 4