So there's this girl, a tall girl, with eyes like honeycomb and jasmine
Sometimes she blows cigarette smoke in your face in the break room, and you call that love
Not because it is, but because you want it to be
Because you're so goddamned lonely, so goddamned unable to handle the ocean roar in your ears when you're alone
You tell yourself that the ash in your lungs is as good as a kiss goodnight, and you write poems about the smoke tendrils whispering off her lips
How beautiful they are, how like the aching arms of god you always wanted them to be
One night, you're tired, so very tired
Your eyes as heavy as water
You forget where you are, in the break room at a Walmart at 2:30 in the morning and you leave your notebook unattended on the table, left out for anyone in the world to see
One of your coworkers picks it up and reads the poems you wrote about the girl with honeycomb and jasmine in her eyes
And you panic when you realize what just happened
And you panic when you realize what just happened because the boy who picked up your notebook, he's a cruel boy
With eyes like shotguns and razor wire
He buys you razor blades on your birthday so you can do the job right next time, you fucking freak
And you can't believe that you aren't one
Can't believe that you deserve to be anything
Some days, you don't even try to hide the angry marks on your arm, like your skin is a test where you got every question wrong
One night, there's a box cutter with a brand new blade
A stack of cardboard boxes begging to feel its tooth
You dig in, but something's wrong, the fiber's too gnarled, and you can't seem to cut clean. You push, hard as you can, feel the stiff tangle of glue give way, and there's blood on the floor, the blade half an inch in your wrist, but you don't feel it
The shift manager is in your ear, angry because he has to take you to the hospital and there's a janitor who'll forever hold it against you for staining his clean, clean floor, and there's everyone you work with and their hostile eyes glaring, knowing this was always, always coming along, that there's that cacophony, all those ghosts reminding you of your destiny for failure
Sometimes she blows cigarette smoke in your face in the break room, and you call that love
Not because it is, but because you want it to be
Because you're so goddamned lonely, so goddamned unable to handle the ocean roar in your ears when you're alone
You tell yourself that the ash in your lungs is as good as a kiss goodnight, and you write poems about the smoke tendrils whispering off her lips
How beautiful they are, how like the aching arms of god you always wanted them to be
One night, you're tired, so very tired
Your eyes as heavy as water
You forget where you are, in the break room at a Walmart at 2:30 in the morning and you leave your notebook unattended on the table, left out for anyone in the world to see
One of your coworkers picks it up and reads the poems you wrote about the girl with honeycomb and jasmine in her eyes
And you panic when you realize what just happened
And you panic when you realize what just happened because the boy who picked up your notebook, he's a cruel boy
With eyes like shotguns and razor wire
He buys you razor blades on your birthday so you can do the job right next time, you fucking freak
And you can't believe that you aren't one
Can't believe that you deserve to be anything
Some days, you don't even try to hide the angry marks on your arm, like your skin is a test where you got every question wrong
One night, there's a box cutter with a brand new blade
A stack of cardboard boxes begging to feel its tooth
You dig in, but something's wrong, the fiber's too gnarled, and you can't seem to cut clean. You push, hard as you can, feel the stiff tangle of glue give way, and there's blood on the floor, the blade half an inch in your wrist, but you don't feel it
The shift manager is in your ear, angry because he has to take you to the hospital and there's a janitor who'll forever hold it against you for staining his clean, clean floor, and there's everyone you work with and their hostile eyes glaring, knowing this was always, always coming along, that there's that cacophony, all those ghosts reminding you of your destiny for failure
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