Squelch

trying to explain to my dog how we all have to wash our dirty hands and he's no exception but he responds with a well choreographed muddy pawed tap dance and now i'm convinced he's right

some know the distance between a rock and a hard place like the back of both hands pushing against the immoveable all a life of proprioception says take up less space succumb to less injury live within these walls choose cost benefit ratios swallow lesser evils keep on keeping on till curtain call

I am noticing the way things are that I would miss if they became a one day wanting to go back to the way things were so that I can sit with them now call them by name with affection rather than them going unnoticed doing what they do for me while hearing me curse the things I wish were not ever

we want to stand as a tree bends gracefully a heroic flex a proven equation showing how to sway to narrowly avoid breaking stood sturdy with years of breathing into surrounding life mapped by rings our bark a bit weathered but you know we hope most that soon the wind will stop asking so much of us

haven't we all reached for a light and stumbled spilled feelings like candle wax all over self and another we're covered in them now warm with a decision to make to stay to scratch ourselves clean or take advantage of this flickering flame and that exit where we'd hope to never mention this again

unclouded day pleasant breeze we overflow with exhilaration as adventure seeking children free of knowing looming dangers we plan for only a day at a time our shadows taller than our worries bikes take us anywhere our curfews ruled by streetlights we're superheroes kings queens or any animal we want

I ask for this hope and fiercely defend it from every bodily sensation or emotion to meet all that's seen against me while most of what's for me is unseen for resilience isn't won through naivety or lack of hardship no I'm not a sweet summer child but my struggle's not my favorite outfit a smile is

I see you being ugly to others & I'm sad you've not found a way yet stuck pushing people away perpetuating a cycle of harm from insecurity that likely began when you didn't have what you needed to feel safe & I hope for better for you to see you can help the world heal if you rock the baby you

We lack some light substance Something to expose for this Numbered unjust tales and a resistance Nothing to whisper about We crave bright places Each to focus on this Spiraling empennage or a hope Everything to dance about

sometimes i cry about how i'm going thru a breakup while listening to a song that was our song, but i'm not and it wasn't, the music just sounded like that

i twirled to slide off a globe that kept spinning while you pointed at the spot under a microscope i was a treasure you couldn't measure you drew an x on a memory of a clock face where i'm not sorry i've fallen out of reach in time but the rhythm and I were never a thing you could keep a finger on

I'm the tired driving at night blind across a desert without man made stops rolling my window up and down promise to stay awake and you're the pull ahead of me out of nowhere with a saving grace tail lights to guide can't thank for all the times you got me safely call you to say I made it home

naming this breakdown, "why is the cake salty, because you're crying in it"

if you were granted a wish to have everything you ever lost would you want it could you find a place to put it could the you changed by losing take it back like it was never gone i think of innocence first and notice it's not a person i grieve most but the way i view all loss thru a lens of one

My dog forces his head into my hands, causing my phone to crash to the floor. "C'mon, scroll my ears," he urges,"we are going to feel better."

I'm taffy pulled into ribbons you love to watch stretch and shine without breaking quiet in a space you claim to give to breathe stifled beyond telling truths I could prove like the rate of your strain affects the way I behave I don't say I see me somewhere else and you alone lagging like hysteresis

it's not a manifesto it's a love letter the doodled hearts should have cleared up any confusion

end a life of pushing & pulling on what won't move you fly wide open into the inertia of flailing outside you're not in now don't feel inside at all reach to float your skin in a sac torn open fall into stranger arms wrap yourself racked in cold air born to breathe but first you'll howl all the pain

you say hang in there as i walk a mental tight rope slip slit by wire in the crease of mind's knees dangling words upside down growing used to the burn switching arms of plans gone numb to pass the mic to a viewer suggestion like "keep on keeping on" i'd never thought of that what is this i'm doing

objectification by straw kings in glass castling moved by less than appeared a tear in a makeshift shield years in the making spiders of fear veins to explain how many tried on a day she was committed carrying a bolder up a rock face a queen facing away from attack blundered bet she won't surrender

touch one hand with my other i'm the left touched by the right i am a pair i'm one when our arms are intertwined mirrorlike i close one eye to see you as me flip to see me as you i feel my touch as your hand and what i want in the way you look at me but when you leave i sit and wonder where i went

"You're gonna love the new lamp, just wait! Okay, are you ready to see?," I ask *I uncover my dog's eyes* He runs out of the room. "No, I do not love lamp. I will not love lamp. I will love the way things were before," he thinks

plastic straw ribcage held by six pack rings gritty sand and the liquid congealed at the bottom of a trash can see the marks they've made on the things that tried to keep growing around em with a brave face the breaths that had to force their way out into unpolluted air and back into a damned place

Take this 5x a day Take this 3x a day Take this morning and night Have you been sleeping Stand up without holding on Push against my arms Hold your head up Don't stop Blow out as hard as you can As hard as you can Do it all all the time As hard as you can As long as you can Harder than that