The fruit bowl is staring at me.
It's eyes are fat, sweet, mangos.
My mother keeps bringing them home for me.
A childhood favorite, she knows.
Something so tropical and sweet
can only remind me of you.
And the mango you plucked for me
ripe from it's tree by the shore.
And the loves you swore to me
juicy, sticky, dripping from your lips.
I haven't the hear to tell her
I have since lost the taste.
The flesh bitter and empty now
like the promises you made to me
their juices stain my mouth, clothing, fingertips.
Everything I have touched is sticky with them.
She tells me not to forget about them.
To eat them before they spoil.
I tell her "I won't forget,"
when what I mean to say is
"I can't."

There is one in every corner of this building.
I just want to be alone.
Go find another one.
Dumb *******.

Her tail flicks with irritation,
Her bed is under occupation.
She lets out a quiet meow,
and begins the prowl.

Her cat bed has been conquered,
her feline smell obscured.
She advances on silent paws,
and stirs up a cloud of claws.

Perhaps the name 'Fluffy'
does not fit her.

I

AM.

I

AM

NOT.

Life is lonely when you learn to deal on your own.
A simple task becomes a challenge and a minute turns into an eternity.
When the world turns its nose, when there isn’t a friend to lean on;
When it becomes impossible to even pick up the phone.
Everything loses its potential in a fog of pain
The concept of trust holds no existence
Life becomes nothing and determination ceases.
Then control is lost over all the emotions contained.

I thought maybe, just maybe
If I cut deep enough I could reach my insides
Because that's where the hurt was,
Deep inside, beneath a layer of skin and flesh.

If I just broke through it,
Maybe it would leak out of me,
An overflow and ooze of pain and hate.

I knew my blood would be black, it had to be,
Since that's what I was filled with- darkness.
The amount wasn't surprising,
It was beautiful.
Each stream released a different pain bottled inside of me,
Like a delicate river in the black of night.

What did surprise me though, was its sticky substance.
But without much thought, the obvious reason came to me-
It was my sickness.
Everyone knows sickness is sticky.
And since my body was all sickness,
It too would run in my blood.

So it was the sticky blackness that kept me going.
It became my reward,
It was empirical evidence that I was getting better.
I had to be, I was losing so much sticky darkness.
There was no plausible way the outcome was reversed.

It wasn't till later that I realized,
If my darkness and sickness was so consuming,
And it was my blood-
Then it was keeping me alive.

The more I drew, the less I lived.
I was not getting better,
I was getting closer to death.

How could I be getting better,
If what I desired most was
a cut of flesh,
a pool of black,
a sticky mess,
a one-way ticket.

The moments when I need you the most,
Are the ones that you never see.
The tears are silent as I tell you I'm alright,
My mind hushes the words that my heart desires to speak.

The sinister silence is my only companion,
No one is there to comfort me.
Alone in the dark, no peace in my empty world,
Salvation is the one I truly seek.

I stand as though I am strong,
The pain carefully hidden behind a mask.
You saw only what I allowed,
Then taken aback when the truth was spoken.

I laid myself open to you,
An unforeseen and immensely challenging task.
You took it for nothing and left me torn,
Now no knowledge remains of my emotions.

To hold on is painful and dangerous,
But to let go means going back on my word.
To stick by my promise, and stick by your side,
Will surely end with my broken heart.

Yet still I stay, I will give you all I have,
Until our hope becomes deterred.
I care enough to let it go,
As my heart is quietly ripped apart.