Looking Good While No One's Looking

So, as per usual when I visit this this site I have a new dilemma. English boy is working his way back into the picture for reasons unknown. I'm currently in a wonderful relationship with the fantastic Mr. Tom. And then... As always with the english boy I pause to wonder. It has been long enough that if it was nothing he would have moved on. Yet he continues to haunt me. As lame and pathetic as it sounds, I still remember the smell of him, his hands, his lips. I try to forget, I really am happy. But I still yearn for him.

And so it ends, an infatuation gone too far
empty rooms, open doors
glass splinters and cotton candy pink
fiber glass insulation

Hello old friend, sweet nothingness
i'll fall again for you anytime
drinking away my loneliness
drinking away your lies.
I don't need this emptyness
i can fill it like a hole
i'll smoke until my lungs collapse
and sleep until I'm old.

the buzz, that warm caress of liquor in my throat
that sweet, sweet burn of nicotine to chase it down the hole
at night i fall with no duress and little memory
into a dark safe place i find deep inside of me
where i don't need your softest flesh to lull myself to sleep
where i can hide in spider webs i've spun with lies you see
i can be self sufficent, oh yes, i've done it all before
and lingered in the greying world that lies outside my door
i don't need the sun to rise i only watch it set
and the happiness i find at night is all i'll ever get
hello old friend, sweet nothingness i'll fall for you again
drinking away my lonely night, drinking away my sense
i don't need your hands at night, i don't need your chest
i'll fill my empty hollow soul with beer and cigarettes
i'll smoke until my lungs collape, drink til my liver fails
and go to bed each and every night knowing no body cares.

taking a walk, gonna clear my mind,
at the end of this road i just might find
a little bit of peace for mine
the sun may set and the moon may rise
but that won't set me off my prize
even if i don't know where it lies
sing a little song to ease my way
little bit of smoke to ease my pain
same old story over again
i'm done.

It's a long walk back to Eden,
I've heard these words before
scrawled them on my mirror
in my shower.
And sitting here tonight
with nothing on but low lamp light
I wonder if I'll ever see sun rise again.
No I'm not going to take my life
but dreams that lie behind my eyes just might,
and I wonder,
maybe that'd just be better.
I can't see you now,
your face has faded from my memory
and I can't taste you now,
my lips too stained with nicotine,
and I don't know for how long
I can take this forever.

Dear Ben,

I don't say this often enough, and I can't make up for all the times I've never been there, but I love you. I really do. It sucks that it takes a scare like this to remind me that I have feelings, or a family, but I guess it does and that makes me a bad person. But I do love you, you mean more to me than you'd ever know. I know you don't remember much about when you were very young, but things were really bad back then. Mom wasn't living with us, she worked, Glenn worked, Glenny wasn't going to school and for that matter neither was I. I stayed home a lot to be with you, and to watch you because no one else could. Yes, grandma helped, but no one could be there often enough, so I did. It is so weird to think that you have always been to me more of a son than a brother. I remember when mom and dad first told us about you, I was 9, Leslie seven, Glenny was three, we were at auntie ava's house, and we ran screaming around the yard "Baby Brother Baby Brother Baby Brother!" because we were so excited. I remember picking out your name, Leslie, mom and I sprawled out late night on their water bed, striking names off notebook paper. You were almost a Peter. I've watched you grow up from so far away that it hurts, it really does, so I bury that hurt with anything I can think of to make it stop, make it small. When you were just a baby, mom and dad got in a car accident that hurt mom pretty badly. She couldn't do much, so I took on the brunt of your care.   Glenny was little, and he and leslie always fought, but there was something about you that was special, something that reminded us that we were a family, the four of US. I remember packing you around on my hip, warming frozen bottles and holding you when you cried. Your favorite night time songs were buffalo girls and the song about riding a horse with no name. You hated christmas carols. Christmas was always hard, usually lean, but watching you tear  open your christmas gifts, now that I look back on it, the joy, the excitement on your face...that was more than I ever could have asked for. As you got older, I sill worked hard every day to do what I could for the family, cooking, cleaning, dishes, laundry, I hated it. I hated that we couldn't be normal, that we couldn't be a real family with a mom that was there and a dad that all of ours instead of just yours. I hated everything about my life, but I never, ever hated you. Sharing a room was hard, especially with all four of us and all of our toys and clothes and books crammed into that little room; but I miss it now that it isn't ours anymore. I miss staying awake and hearing everyone breathe late at night, Glenny snoring, Leslie shifting and you talking in your sleep. When you first said my name, you called me Lala, just like the yellow teletubbies that you loved and I despised. But the nickname stuck, it's the only one I've ever had. I remember when you started walking, and we would let you out in the summer on the farm, running around in your diaper with no shirt or shoes, screaming with laughter with the warm, dry grass under your toes. When you started school, your first day, we walked hand in hand down the driveway, and it was all that I could do to convince you to sit by yourself up front while I walked halfway down the bus to sit with my friends. I wish I would have stayed with you. When the quail hit the side of the bus, all the kids laughed and squealed with joy, but you, ever sensitive, ever caring, ever loving Benjamin, you cried because you understood. You understood. I miss reading to you, I wish I would have done it more. I wish I would have tried harder, been better, been stronger. I never gave everything I had, I thought I did, but now I understand that I could have done so much more for you. I am so proud of the person you are, so proud of the person you are becoming, I just wish you could know how much I care, how much I will always care for you. I love Glenny, and I love Leslie, but you are special to me in a way that words cannot describe. Knowing that you are sick, so very far away kills me. I hope you're not scared, I hope you never carry the constant fear that I live with, the constant struggle to be normal and feel fine. I hope that dad gets you seven-up and crackers and lets you watch tv in the living room and cheetos the cat will lay with you and purr, just like he did when he was a kitten. I hope you're ok, and I hope you'll be ok, because out of everything I've ever done in life, everything I've created, everything I've changed, you are the most important, the best, and the most beautiful thing I have ever had a hand in. I love you; and your future is so bright and amazing. Anything I could ever do to help you, no matter what, anything I have to offer that you might need will always be yours, without question, without fail. I love you, brother, I love you Ben. Please be ok.

Your big sister, Karla

If tears could stop the pain, could drown the hurt, could fill the void, I would be just fine.

I stayed up all night
waiting for your call,
smoked a pack of cigarettes
and choked on them all,
sharp taste,
nicotine burn,
eyes water,
lips crack like my resolve,
like my spine,
like my spirit,
and out pours
the immaterial,
drained,
powder white,
diluted (smoke),
is that my soul?

I tried to forget the words on your lips,
like ships on open water
they sailed beyond safe harbor
laying anchor in my heart and in your kiss
bitterness, vinegar on an open wound
the I love yous that came too soon
And on that first faithless tryst
you promised me nothing
for something, just one thing

This is getting to be too much.
There are so few things I enjoy anymore,
all at my fingertips,
if I could only lift them.
I feel like I'm under water,
heartbeat slowed, skin numb,
Lethargic,
empty,
sour.
I'm a hole.
Even writing is too much
my attention wanders,
my eyes zone into unfathomable
gray nothingness
seeing nothing
wanting nothing.
I am nothing.

So, bawling my eyes out. I don't have the money for this shit, but hey, everyone has to go into debt sometime. Fuck my future, fuck moving out, fuck having a life at all. I need all four out as soon as possible, and I can't even afford one. AND the stupid fuckers at the dentists office charged me 150 fucking dollars for one x-ray and a ten minute visit. So now, I'm broke, swollen and infected, and having to start over on square one. I fucking hate my life.

I'll get out if it kills me
I just might have to jump out of my skin to do it
but I'll get out, I'll be free
I'll forget every nasty word, every hurt, every slight
I'll wash you away like the scum you are,
the scabs on my knees,
the dirt under my nails.