I dreamed once that I kissed you
When I awoke I cried
I told myself I didn't want you

Sleep came slowly last night
Tears high with the rising tide
I dreamed once that I kissed you


I told myself I didn't want you


I dreamed once that I kissed you

I forget how it looks: the light
But I still can't decide
I told myself I didn't want you

Let's go back to tonight
To the moment before I died
I dreamed once that I kissed you
I told myself I didn't want you

Stop.

Stop everything.

Don't move, don't think, don't breathe.

Listen to me.

What is important to you?

That's scary... isn't it? I'm sure you have many wonderful answers, like religion, family, success. Tell me... Do you feel it in your bones how important they are? Does your heart beat faster because it beats for those things?

Can you tell me how much they mean to you? Will you cry because there's nothing more sacred?

I hope you do.

I hope you've got something to live for. Everyone should.

1. I'm that weird kid who never talks to anyone in class. You know when the teacher says, "Go find a group." And there's always one kid who just keeps their head down and waits until no one's noticed that they don't have a group and works alone? That's me. Most of the time I don't even switch to grade papers with anyone because the thought of talking to someone I'm not close with makes me so uncomfortable.

2. I hate meeting new people simply because I've met too many. Everyone intimidates me.

3. I am intensely awkward.

4. I know exactly who I am, and I hate it.

5. If we were at any point, friends, I will always be able to recall your full name.

6. Don't lie to me. I will never lie to you.

7. When I'm upset, don't try to cheer me up. Hold my hand, play with my hair, hug me. That will do me more good than anything.

8. I told my mother for years that I thought she should divorce my dad. It's happening now, and it still hurts me.

9. My lack of following through on my ambition terrifies me.

10. My family has a history of divorce and failed relationships. This hasn't scared me away from them, and I'm not sure why.

11. I went to church for the first time in months yesterday. I cried. A lot. Around complete strangers, by myself. It was one of the hardest things I've ever done. I told only my mother and one of my friends. Sorry if I screened your call and didn't text you back.

12. I constantly worry that no one will ever fall in love with me because when it comes to flirting or being considered for a girlfriend,  I seem to be very bad at it.

13. I didn't start acting until 9th grade. I didn't take it seriously until 10th.

14. I've always wanted to take singing lessons, piano lessons, and karate lessons. The reason I never did was because my family couldn't afford it.

15. I like my mom's side of the family more than my dads.

16. I hate gatorade. All kinds.

17. I bought red headphones a couple weeks ago because they reminded me of when red was my favorite color. It was my favorite color because a boy named Tanner Fraughton used to wear a red shirt.

18. I miss the tree in my front yard. I used to sit in it and draw.

19. I'm a terrible artist. I've never been able to keep up with all my artist friends.

20. I often stay quiet during classroom debates because even if I'm fairly certain I'm right, I don't want to be wrong.

21. I'm a lot more like my mother than I care to admit. I love her dearly.... but I never want to become her. Her trials are far too much for me to ever bear. That scares me. A lot.

22. I don't often say I love you. Those words are special to me and I find it difficult to make them leave my throat.

Look at the sky. The stars. Accept your insignificance,  and then accept your individuality. You are just one life in billions, but there has never been a you before.

Embrace that.

Forget.

Let everything troubling you go away.

Forget.

Think only of yourself, close your eyes and breathe. This isn't selfish, it's medetative.

Your mind will explode into colors behind your eyelids, and you will hear yourself speak.

This is good.

Hear what you have to say, without judgement. It's okay if you begin talking about things that don't matter, they will run their course. You will be left with emptiness.

Do not fear it.
Emptiness is not scary.
Sometimes it's exactly what you need.

Once you've reintroduced yourself, open your eyes again. Breathe in the cool air. (Your should be doing this outside, at night. Otherwise the air will probably be stale with everyone else's words and you don't want that. At night, the air is cool and fresh, and most importantly, not used.) Don't move. Smile a little, maybe. If you feel like it. Get up only when you think to yourself, "I wish I could feel this way all the time."

Embrace that thought. Know that no moment will ever last forever, and cherish it.

Go home.

Go to sleep.

Promises to you are tattooed on my palms and they don't mean anything but I'm tired of explaining myself

So I'll let go of it

Instead I'll tell you about the beauty of our world

The infinite amount of perfect moments with perfect people and how we need to cherish them

How we need to create them, because there is a serious shortage of prefect people

but perfect moments?

Endless.

Dancing with your friends, accidental late nights when words are more important than curfews,  the catharsis that comes after tears, the first time you truly get to see a person's soul.

Love.

Never stop celebrating it. Love is the root of all beauty and it's invaluable.

Forgetting that has made me very, very tired.

I hate school dances.

I'm not saying I'm not loved, I'm just saying I'm not loved in the way that gets me asked to dances.

I hate school dances because they do this to me.

It doesn't feel real yet.

Dear ______,
I love you. Please be careful with your heart. Don't let it become the hairy heart from that Beedle the Bard story. Love, but learn to love with pure intentions. I hate what I see you doing to yourself. I want to see you happy.
Forever (kind of) in love with you,
Me

Dear _____,
You're kind of scaring me. I wish you didn't.
Confused,
Me

Dear ____,
I don't understand you. Furthermore I don't understand how I feel about you. Sometimes I want to kiss you but sometimes I want to slap you in the face.
Confused but a little in love with you,
Me

Dear ____,
I regret how little I saw you this summer. I love you. I hope we get to have many adventures this year. Let's make it count.
Love,
Your wife

Dear _____,
If I was into girls I'd marry you.
Love,
Me

Dear _____,
Calm down. Please. Go away and calm down.
Still waiting,
Me

Dear ___,
I hate you more than I've ever hated a person in my life dear lord please die.
Fantasizing about murder,
Me

Dear _____,
I truly have no idea how to react to you. Literally why. I don't know why I'm nice to you. You're cute.... But little. And also clingy. Literally. Please let go of my leg.
Kind of scared of you,
Me

Dear _____,
I like you. When you're normal.
Love,
Me

Somehow, you've forced yourself into my life.
There's so much that's strange about that.
Mostly the fact that you seem to enjoy talking to me more than most of my friends.
Mostly because I'm nearly certain the next year of my life will be some sort of Gym/work/online school-induced hell. And you're turning out to be the one person who won't contribute to that.

Now I'm thinking about this looming school year again.

Shit.

I wish it was over. I wish it could be over so I don't have to worry anymore. So I can work and make money and hopefully be accepted to a college to learn something.

Teach me how to love properly. Teach me how to feel things the way I'm supposed to. Teach me how to smile. Please.

I'm begging for enlightenment. For inspiration, for talent, for worth. I'm begging to graduate. God.

I never thought I'd need that so badly. Begging to graduate. Hoping I'm not so lazy that I end up with a GED and no prospects for my future. Hoping I get to work doing something I love. Hoping my lack of following through on my ambition doesn't fuck me over again.

Dear God,
Help me. I think this time around... I really need you. Forgive me.
Still confused,
Me.

Isn't it funny how even though I still see you most days, you're already a ghost to me?

It was a day of mistakes.

The negative connotation is a little too potent, and it sticks in your nostrils like the smell of tires burning on cement.

Exciting, nonetheless wrong.

It was a day when all I thought about (again) was how little I feel and think like I used to. When rather than imagining and philosophizing I imagine that I still have an imagination.

An oxymoron.

The Day of Mistakes is never just a single day. It is a single day in that there are 24 hours with the potential to mess up.

I know better than anyone that we all have months of these Days in our memories, stapled together and sent to the Department of Edification and Humiliation.

And so I say again: it was a day of mistakes.

Mistake is synonymous with regret and regret is indeed a nasty word. And yet we are constantly reminded, "We all make mistakes and we learn and grow from them."

Do I regret my mistakes? Like everyone, yes and no. When I think of mistakes I think of a little girl wearing a jacket that didn't belong to her and said, "San Francisco" on it who almost believed that if she wished hard enough she could go back in time and make another choice.

I think of myself (how narcissistic of me) and how I still read too much fantasy not to half-believe that time travel exists.

It         was           a           day             of          mistakes.

A day where I didn't feel enough, didn't learn enough, didn't love enough, didn't empathize enough, didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't didn't

didn't.

There was a day
when you held me.
When you let me hold you and
neither of us spoke
because it was
comfortable
and there was no
need to.

We didn't talk
about the kiss afterward.
We ignored it,
but that was okay.

There was a time
when I was certain
you loved me...
In some way,
because you gave me
your hands and I let you.

The words
I love you
were always unspoken
in the air.
something was always
wrong
with those words
and us.

The meaning was
lost in translation
I think.

To the seniors,
This is it. Today was the last day. You've started a new chapter and so have I. One that feels so lonely my heart is breaking because of it. I hope you like college. I hope you have parties, make friends, do stupid things with new people who are so much better than stupud highschoolers. 

I hope you drink to being an adult. I hope you raise your glass to a bright future. I hope you have late nights and late mornings like you never used to have.

To growing up. To being free. To leaving highschool in the past.

Estranged, me



To the seniors, 
How did you do it? For the first time today, I had to tell someone that next year I'm going to be a senior in highschool. The words stuck to my throat like the elmers glue we used in elementary school. One time, and I almost lost it.

I am lost.

I don't know how to grow up. I don't know how to be the oldest, because I still feel like a sophomore most days. You are supposed to be there, telling me how to get through all these classes. Telling me I don't need to do anything in Mangam's class because he doesn't grade anything. I can't be a leader, people shouldn't look up to me. That jacket should have your name on it, not mine.

How do I do this next year?

Errant, me




To the seniors,
I don't want to pick up that pen and write anything to you in the yearbook because writing something means saying goodbye and I know it's hard for you to leave but right now it's harder for me to know I'm facing next year alone.

Ephemeral, me

Goodbye.

Hold on for a second.

Let me speak for a moment.

Don't get offended if I swear for a few minutes.

I am really fucking angry. And I don't care how shit this is, because I'm not sure if you heard me:

I AM REALLY FUCKING ANGRY.

I hate using caps, I hate it when people use them in their posts. It makes me uncomfortable, okay.

But

I AM REALLY FUCKING ANGRY.

What are you supposed to to do when someone you love, someone who you've only ever loved decides to hurt you? When they not only hurt you physically and emotionally, but when they laugh about it and you feel like some lost puppy because the reasoning behind their actions completely escapes you and you cannot comprehend the reasoning.

This sounds like I have an abusive boyfriend. I'm realizing that as I reread what I just wrote.

And I guess it doesn't sound too far off, which is weird to realize.

And unless I want to explain the entire situation to the internet and dozens of friends and acquaintances there isn't much more to say.

I'm just really fucking angry and I'm taking it out on my blog.

Sorry I don't have an artistic abstract poem to explain my feelings of divine rage or whatever.

In first grade I thought I had control over the wind.

Now I'm in eleventh grade and I don't have control over anything.

How did it happen that I was more free when I was seven than I am ten years later? Doesn't growing up mean freedom?

Ten years later and I am a slave to my own life. Ten years later and I care more about the well-being of a gangly boy with too many secrets than I do about myself. Ten years later and 'Myself' is just a word with no meaning because the person behind it is just a word with no meaning.

Hi, I'm Hailey. I love you more than I love me because I've got more reasons to love you than I've got to love me and I know that's morbid or messed up and I probably need therapy but it's the truth and I've finally learned to accept that... And it feels really good.

-----

I'm going to ask you a question, and you might not know how to answer it, or you might be afraid too, but that's okay.

Who are you?

Dig down to the core of yourself, that small bit that links your soul to your heart, your spirit to your body and try to find out what keeps your soul inside yourself with all that blood.

I'll tell you who you might be, for a start.



You might be a girl who has dyed her hair too much and painted her nails too much and can't stand the look of her own face without something covering part of it up. A girl who knows she is vain and vapid but doesn't know what the word "real' means, so she forgets it exists every day until she forgets she ever cared.



You might be a boy who lifts weights and has a family called his team because he's with them more than his parents and siblings. Who knows he's a stereotype but it doesn't matter because high school is his playground and he is the king. Who loves and thinks and has things to say but no one ever hears because everyone says his words aren't important.



You might be a boy who is just scared. Who's secrets weigh his feet to the ocean floor and it's so dark he can't see a damn thing. A boy who wonders every day of his life which of his friends love him.
Who runs from the ones that do.
Who built a wall around his soul so long ago he would rather die than dismantle it.
Who covers his ears and refuses to look at you when you ask him who he is because either he doesn't know or he doesn't like it. But he'll never tell you which.



You might be a girl with hair that is too short. Who wears jeans and t shirts every day and doesn't care if you think she's interested in boys or girls because DID THAT EVER MATTER ANYWAY. A girl covered in paint and words and the tracks of her dried tears because the crying stopped a long time ago.

--

In first grade
I thought
I controlled the wind

In second grade
I thought
I wasn't pretty

In third grade
I thought
I wasn't smart

In fourth grade
I thought
I was an artist

In fifth grade
I thought
He was beautiful

In sixth grade
I thought
I was in love

In seventh grade
I thought
I was broken

In eighth grade
I thought
I'd never make it

In ninth grade
I thought
I was meant to be lonely

In tenth grade
I thought
I was happy

In eleventh grade
I thought
I kept falling



















through










the




air.


----------------------------------------------

Hi. I'm Endymion. And I can say that I really don't mind that you all know my name. Most of you probably don't know me, but now I guess I'm free to show you who I am.

Yes, my name is Hailey. (Just Hailey. Don't call me Hay because that just sounds stupid.) I'm an artist. I create pictures too, not just word-thoughts.

Now I can show you.

Hold my hand. Show me that you're real.

(because you seem so transparent.)

Please don't be a figment of my anxiety and show me who you are.

Hold my hand again. Touch my face again. Kiss me again. Hug me and hold me and be with me and

Show me that you are real.

Talk to me, Mister Mistake. Teach me because without you I'll never learn.

I'm a terrible student.

Hold my hand, Mister Love. Support me because without you I'll never be brave.

Kiss me, Mister Sadness. Remind me because without you I'll never know happiness.

Mister You... Don't abandon me. Stay with me because I'm scared of you but I'm more scared without you.

Somewhere along the line the sun started rising from the wrong direction. The porch in front of my house got smaller and it only makes me want to spend more time there but still I don't.

The yard is messier and newer and the weather warmer. It's old and new and borrowed but it's not quite blue anymore and I think I like that most of all.

Not to say I like it there. I guess it doesn't really matter. I'm never there anyway.

"I can't take much more of this. I don't know how to act around you or what to do and it's killing me."

--

This is for YOU.

Because I can't hold all of this in anymore and I know I'm too impatient for my own good and I'm sorry.

It causes me to make quite a lot of mistakes. And in doing that, I've hurt you.

I'm sorry.

I don't think you want to hear anything but I love you and I made a mistake I know but I never meant to hurt you or upset you. I only meant to love you.

I know that what I said was "You need me" but what I meant was "I need you."

I was wrong. Is that what I have to say?

I need you.

I need you to talk to me, because until then I am lost and slowly cracking under my own pressure.

You are breaking me.

Maybe I deserve that. Maybe I am breaking you too.

But we can fix that.

--

I keep saying I'm broken and you keep saying I'm broken and everyone keeps saying it and

Stop
Giving
Me
Hugs

I don't need pity. I need glue.

--

Hello. I'm Endymion. And I'm a nomad. My feet are freezing and its snowing outside but the desire for hot chocolate evades me.

The desire for silence is overpowering.

Are you okay? How are you doing? Has your dad moved out yet? How many classes are you failing today? Why do you come home so late? Why do you look so sad? Do you need anything? Are those pills helping?

I miss you.

You've changed.

Why have you changed?

Everything is wrong I know that but I'm lost.

I say

"I'm fine."

"I feel a little better."

"I don't know."

And they aren't lies but they feel like lies and I still don't know why that is. Maybe because they are all temporary.

Everyone keeps saying I'm broken and I've stopped saying I'm broken and you just realized

I'm broken.

But don't tell anyone. They don't need to know.

Because I'm okay and I'm doing fine and my dad still lives here and I'm only failing one class right now and I come home late because waiting for you is all I want to do now and I forgot how to look happy but I don't need anything and the pills just make me antsy.

I miss you too.

I know.

I don't know.

The times that I have refrained from saying your name are starting to wear me down. The number of nights I've sat awake with the fireflies in my hands and pondered where we went wrong are too many.

When I stopped carrying you and starting noticing that my bare feet were eroding in the mud they sank into and the fireflies left with your name on their wings I realized that I barely knew it anymore. I don't know if you know mine or if you are still as lonely as you were when we sat together in biology making fun of the kids who came to class high. Do you remember when we made crude jokes and fun of everyone who wasn't us to hide beneath our stinging hearts?

We were bad for each other. I loved you but that love poisoned my heart and my eyes stayed in your pockets with nothing to see but the widening black that existed there. I know I left you. I know I hurt you.

But the truth is that your hands hurt me. Your hands crushed my eyes in your pockets until I cried for relief and told you that you were right. Your hands wrung my neck until I said I loved you and your damn hands broke my ankles and left me crippled and far more alone than I had ever been before.

And you cried when I said I couldn't stay.

You left me because we both know you always hated feeling weak.

I cried when you said you couldn't stay.

You left me because we both know I was always the weak one.

     .     .        .          .                           .            .                   ..             .        .    . .
             .              .                .  .                       .       .