Looks like a Poem, Feels like a Poem

i'm tired of slipping over my words like it's ice on the driveway
and i'm tired of repeating the sentences you never said over and over in my head
like the lyrics to an overplayed song on the radio
and i'm tired of god telling me the world's going to burn

because i just want someone to tell me that tonight is alright
i can check for monsters under my bed because i won't find any there
and someone doesn't have to shine a flashlight in my head to check what's hiding in the shadows

my heart will start beating the rhythm of yours if we just get close enough to sync them
but i'm scared the itunes of your heart is lined with dubstep
and the clash of my youth lagoon playlist with your 2010 skrillex would give me a seizure

but i never went to science class because i was at the doctor's office
where i learned that the best nurses have tattoos
and the best doctors have dead daughters

i'm just remembering the days the leaves fell
and the ghosts gave in
i always heard that you can't be afraid of just words
but i was

and i'm not ashamed.

for six years i've never seen the colors
and i think it's because of these glasses i was wearing
i was choked by disappointment the same way i first let his hands on my throat
it was easier to spill the numbness in after the fear eroded

you would know i'm guilty of labeling the masses by the way they make me feel
and i can't figure some of you people out, so you go uncounted in this box with no name
but my brain thinks you're still important because i don't forget the memories

i don't know how many swear words i can get away with until they call me low class
or how many big words i have to use until they call me educated

but know i never wanted you to be like me because
i'm sick sick sick in the head and i'm sick sick sick in the heart and all the water is filling up to my chest
and my lungs are too patient and my heart is praying.

and all the words my heart can speak are these
"she's graduating god, she's graduating."
and i think he smiles and looks proud
but i can't be sure

because heaven was always made for the preps and the jocks
and i don't know if i'll ever get to meet god
but i'd ask him if rainbows are the curl of his lips and if they are i'd ask him
why he smiles upside down

i always wanted to meet my piano man
but my fingers were too slow to hear the music properly
and i couldn't tap my fingers along to the sound of your cries
'cause my heartbeat already counts down the seconds til we forget

i forget what it's like to miss you
but it doesn't stop me from tapping my heart on the shoulder every time you walk by
it doesn't stop the flashbacks of winter
or park bathrooms
but it stops the smile halfway on my face
and the butterflies' wings are sitting at the bottom of my stomach
and the acid eats away at the pretty colors

(all i wanted were all the pretty colors
you never gave me all the pretty colors)

i thought one of us would die for the hall of fame
but saying it out loud made it too real
i thought one of us would die for a shout out on nelson's blog
but all you had to do was go to rehab

Please please find me here
because all i ever wanted was someone to tell me
they understand why death is a woman
because of course she wears black stilettos

all i ever wanted was someone to tell me
they understand why blogging is like a one night stand
because my handwriting reminds me of stretchmarks and commitment

all i ever wanted was more than a handful of change in my pocket
and a cardboard kid to tell my story
because cardboard is brown and diagnoses are black and empty
like the back cover of my journal
because cardboard doesn't ask questions
because cardboard is lifeless and a virgin at that

i guess i'm telling you not to forget about the sloppy kisses

i still like the color purple better than i like the color violet
and indigo was always for the painters and art majors

i could always collect my thoughts better on a keyboard than on napkins
but maybe it's because i was finally sitting down long enough to listen

all i remember is the blood blood blood on the sidewalk
and my bones were scared to talk now that they'd seen my eyes
and brushed lips with my skin
right in front of oxygen

all i know is coke tastes better in a bottle
and the red and green of stoplights remind me of bruises
semi-colons
and slammed doors

i want a tattoo but there's too much i want my skin to say
plus i think if i wrote it all out
it'd look more like a novel

and there's billboards that claim to know if i'm going to heaven or hell
and sometimes i dial hoping god's gonna pick up the phone
but it's only a man on the other line
who doesn't know my name or my shoe size

and i hate to say i'm disappointed

but i am.

because as often as i search the clouds for a hint of his face
or breathe in the wind wondering what cologne he wears in the afternoon
i never know where to look for his voice

but i heard it in the titanic sinking and the impromptu happy birthday
i heard it when harold miner talked to me at the assembly about choices
two years ago at the pulpit of a funeral
in the life and verbs of alis priddy
i heard it in grace kelly when she told me to drag out the days and give voice to the i love you's
i heard it in my sister when she said she lived for a reason
in the jumble of letters i plastered into my smashbook
when i reread a letter from god that fell between the cracks
i heard it
i heard it
i heard it

and he hears me.