#02262019

[oliver-hawthorn]

For the bitch who shot my best friend;

Did you know the fragments of sharp metal

Would bury itself in her bones?

Did you know she was only eight years old?

I hadn't even met her yet, then,

But I knew her until she turned 21.

I knew her recovering from the trauma,

From the metal rotting in her skin as she aged with it,

I know the way she would later cut herself open

Trying to itch the gunpowder out.

I know the doctors tried to dig it all out of her

For years before they gave up, long after she had.

I know the drugs and drink she turned to;

How the addiction filled the bullet hole

Maybe even better than cotton ever could have.

I know the bridge she jumped off of

And I spend nights wondering if that last sound

Of impact she heard

Reminded her of the gunshot, too,

Like every closed door ever did,

Like every whisper ever did,

Like every threat ever did,

This poem is not about a gun.

This poem is not about a shooter.

This poem is not about how my best friend was shot.

It's just that sometimes,

I feel even more tired of writing about rape,

Than the world seems to be about reading it.

I do hope,

Though,

That someone fucking shoots you,

Someday.

And that is not a metaphor.

[amidthedust]

How much guilt can one person preemptively accumulate

While building the bridge they want to throw themselves off of

While mourning those who have not yet jumped?

At what point do you call it a suicide?

When the first brick is laid with intent?

Or when the body hits the ground?

Sometimes, I have to remind myself I didnt build that bridge,

For you.

It had been there for a long time.

Built by hands I've never seen.

But I remember when I jumped the first time.

I remember all of the times I ever jumped,

Ever hit the ground, over you, over your death,

Before you had ever even died.

[oliver-hawthorn]

I woke up on fire in the middle of the night

Stood up today already burnt out

Hey, you,

I miss you and yeah, im still angry sometimes

All actions have consequences,

Even the very last one

Did you know that?

You probably knew.

I dream of you a lot, sometimes

And miss you when I don't

I sent your mom a mothers day gift

So that she wouldn't be missing one this year,

I'm here, still following through on all the things

You aren't and

Im still angry sometimes.

I told you once that I felt like

I never left your front porch,

The day I moved across the country.

That isnt true anymore, you know?

Somedays now I wake up

And feel like I felt the day of your memorial

Standing under that bridge

In the same spot you hit the ground

It was sadness, of course it was fucking sadness,

But it was also rage, you know?

White hot and burning and fixed in me.

Like when something goes so wrong

You dont think it will be right again-

That frustrated buzzing feeling.

The thing is, I really can't ever make it right again.

I think thats the hard part.

Ive never been good at puzzles,

Did you know that?

Its been a year and a half and

I don't think I can put you back together and

How do you put ashes back together, anyway?

Anyway,

Your birthday is in two days,

So

Happy Birthday.

[amidthedust]

Before I moved,

My dad took you and I to the range,

To shoot his guns.

We had to leave early in the morning,

And it was cold, so cold,

We and our layered jackets fumbled into the car.

You were a good shot,

You learned fast,

But you didnt shoot for long.

I liked shooting,

Liked feeling the kick, seeing my target at the end.

We went back to my house after,

Fell asleep,

Didnt wake up again until late afternoon.

We spent one of our last days together,

At least, what we thought would be one of our last days,

Asleep, gunpowder scented, next to each other.

You told me years later

Youd thought about shooting yourself,

But didnt because I'd been watching you so close.

I think that was the first time you ever waited for me.

Sometimes I can still see you asleep next to me on the floor,

Amidst my piles of books, bundled up,

Sleeping it off,

The same way I was.

You waited for me, then.

I hope you're waiting for me again, now.

[amidthedust]

Quiet.

Back home, last week, I built a memorial.

It was small, made of sticks and stones,

Made of pieces of glass and flowers and dirt.

It sits by the bridge, across the river

From where she jumped.

I spent a lot of my time back home sitting there.

It is quiet, there.

The people who did stop by said hello,

Asked who passed away,

Wished me, or whoever I was with, and i,

Safety. Healing. Peace.

It is quiet, there.

I played her music, softly, through my phone.

I sat and drank wine with my feet in the water.

I looked across the river, where she would have hit the ground.

It's just so quiet, there.

I thought, of course, of all of the bad truths.

How easy it seemed, at the time;

The idea of becoming part of the rock, and the river,

Becoming a part of the Quiet, with her.

I think, somehow, for a moment, I felt peace, there.

I think I'd found it, kneeling by her makeshift headstone.

I think I felt her in the stillness, in the empty,

That was what peace is meant to feel like, isnt it?

Then I put the bad truths away again.

I swear I felt peace, but I haven't felt it since.

I'm still trying to believe that is a good thing,

That that moment I really thought I would go find her,

The span of the moment in which I'd accepted it,

Wasnt really peace, but false peace, temporary peace.

I've been on too many sides of that sort of acceptance

To not see through it, eventually.

Since it left, I have felt more

Like a broken glass than a person.

I feel like I cannot get full enough,

Like all of my new edges are only good for

Cutting the people who try to help fill me.

I cant tell if I am cruel, or if I am afraid,

Or if I am tired of things being broken, all the time,

Tired of the world and it's people,

The constant breaking and anger and leaving and fear.

Or, maybe,

I am finally, finally, just not here, anymore.

Maybe I'm back home, by the river.

Maybe I'm back home, maybe it is quiet there.

[amidthedust]

When he was young,

My brother went through a slinky phase.

Which means I,

The six year, one day older sibling,

Went through this sort of

Untangling phase.

I got really good at it, eventually;

Untangle a slinky in the dark good.

I learned to untangle slinkies the same way

I learned to sew his stuffed animals before

My dad could call them broken and throw them out.

I was good as saving things

That people had decided were no longer worth saving;

But they were important to my brother.

They were important to somebody.

Once, he came to me with a slinky,

The biggest one he had, and therefore his favorite.

"Its messed up."

I took it, and untangled it, and then,

I found the bend.

The out of place plastic

Bent completely out of shape in just a small little section;

You could miss it, if you werent looking for it.

I remember the look on his face when I told him it was broken.

He had asked me if it would still go down the stairs.

I told him it probably wouldnt, anymore.

I think, in a way,

That might be what broken means.

When it loses its ability to even fall down the stairs

In the right kind of way, or maybe

Maybe broken means

Not being able to become damaged more

In a way that could at all make you

Worse at being able to do whatever thing you were made for?

Maybe broken doesnt just mean "cant be fixed",

But something like

"Cant be fixed, and anyway,

It couldnt remember or do any of the things it did before it broke,

Even if we made it /look/ fixed, so..."

[amidthedust]

I didnt cry when my grandpa died until his funeral,

Which means, really,

This isnt sadness.

This is a precursor to the sadness;

This is the red morning sky the sailor taught his children about.

I keep wondering what they put you in.

They put my grandpa in a heavy wooden box

I had a dream last night that they put you in every cigarette

I would ever smoke,

Didnt tell me till the last one,

I cracked you open, saw the last pieces of you, ashen, gray,

Absent,

I wonder if they will even let me see you, or whatever they left of you.

I suddenly dont want to smoke, anymore,

But I'd give anything to share a pack, with you.

[amidthedust]

I'm gonna get this tattood on my left wrist, for my friend. ♡

(Might change it slightly but I like it)