johnny truant writes a sonnet

Her face was beaten
from the air beneath butterflies struggling to fly
with lashes made of pollen grains
that insects kissed her eyes with
and she dances with fluidity in her limbs
like virus could never flow through her veins
but for now, she settles
for painting the town red
watching sitcoms at 3 in the morning

But she is ballet in a way that makes me born again
watching her wings uncurl and flutter lightly in the wind
because I
have never seen anyone handle uncertainty
with as much grace as she does
teetering on 5 inch heels
fending off judgments on street corners in our mind
where she caters to our every desire
she is frolics at midnight under the moon
and her skin radiates pearls that make oysters jealous
I’m forced to admire her every-day-ness
right down to the crooked toes that I kiss to sleep at night

and the splints society puts her in
only hinders her from spreading her wings,
painting skies with feather tips of perseverance
caught in limbo between honey and vinegar

Her name is Bambi
and she's innocent
like the deers in headlights grinding on your grill
when you’ve got the brights on like diamond studded teeth

She swears she’s not a slut,
she’s just earning her way through college
college – that useless liberal arts degree she’s paying for herself
cause her parents gave up on dreaming long ago

It’s just killing people in different ways, she reckons
dancing on bars like prison cells
in limelights that crust over like deposits on that shower
you swear you’re going to clean out someday
but the calcium keeps beating on your skin til then
so in the meantime,
make it rain on my scarlet letter
cause she uses the wrinkled dollars
to buy a better future

And baby, I’m in love with a stripper
she’s tears after a particularly rough feeling-up
and she’s pin up glory with breasts that surgeons pay to touch
and I love her body like you abuse it
I’ve seen her at her most beautiful
sculpting her face with sink water in beat up jeans
beat up
the way her last boyfriend
used the radiator to love her bones
so I’d patch her up face with concealer and Eskimo kisses

So I will vindicate her from society
because she is written in the arteries
that remind me the rest of my body how to live my life
cause she’s just another chrysalis
that will evolve into an angel and fly
and someday she will spread wings like legs
and take off into the sky

for what it's worth

Every time I loved you
Was another song in the soundtrack of my life
Found poems of
Missing beats,
Off key -
Strokes are playing on the radio;
Oh baby I feel so down
It turns me off
When I feel left out

Trading broken souls for records the size of my dreams
Piling up in the archives
Being scr-scr-scratched with my fingertips
Skipping like hearts that pump a little too fast when I’m around you
Cut grooves in my fingers from stand up bass strings
Just a little too heavy to bend without catharsis to the key of A minor

Every time I loved you
Was a story for each of the frets on my guitar,
Grinding down like my teeth at night
Hoping it’s not the last time I hold you

Lost souls
Step carefully over the broken glass now
The fish that swam in it are long gone;
Our years have become desperately held kisses

I know you’re leaving
Please don’t leave,
I’m quaking like the tectonic tremblings in imogen heap melodies
That the speakers next to my ears scream
As you try to drown out my pleas
With warfare onscreen

Every time I loved you was
A major city whose name I carved into my veins just in case
I forgot to visit them before we became terminal
Sitting in airports for arrivals that will never land

Because loving you never had false pretenses of
Chocolate and red flowers delivered to the doorstep
(but not roses, they’re too cliché)
And if I could cliché a romance it’d be
Flower petals with sonnets of stardust hieroglyphics written on the insides of pistils
Stamens shot up like heroin in hopes of getting high off of a better future
So baby, objectify my sexuality like a katy perry song


And after you
I sang myself lullabies of Joseph Heller and Aldous Huxley to stop from wilting
And I saw it as an extended metaphor for all that could have been
Like metaphors that had given up on being great and settled for being a simile

After you
I found love poems to you etched as scars in my esophagus
And the ulcers that stomach acid should never cause in my mouth
Because I loved you past your expiration date
And the putrid stench of sour milk still lingers in my nostrils when I lean over the toilet
Purging thoughts of you that comforted me like laxatives never should

After you
I found solace in early morning emergency room visits
From bleeding you out a little too much
There are cuts so deep on the insides of my thighs
They sing romance and objectification like r&b songs


But now I cradle self-affirmation as my prophecy
Holding confidence between my fingertips like rosary beads

I am self-improvements from slashing you out of my veins with optimism
Sonnets written on the insides of my wrists like stigmata
Telling stories of triumph and survival from deconstructing myself
until I had broken down to rock bottom
Whistled breaths of confidence between buckteeth waxing nostalgic
Waning moons pulling in tides of change like loose coins stuck in childhood piggy banks
Cashing in every time I loved you
For what it’s worth

math like poetry

I want to write away wrongs.

I want a boy who speaks math like poetry
but still understands the difference between
you’re contraction and your possessive;
someone who brings mental diversity lyrically

I want a girl that challenges my fictions,
who sings her way past my safeguards
and can explain calculus in simple English
So give me brave new words to explore my world with

I want a boy who dreams of overcoming statistics
Formulas for better futures tattooed on limbs
with warning signs of defying the norm
with things like outliers
because what is popular is not always right,
and what is right not always popular

I want her like diversity in the languages I speak
Tongues like prophesies proclaiming positivity
Liberated from shackles of conventional thinking

I want a boy who’s a distraction
Close captioned in dialects of ingenuity
With subtitles of hope between his lips
Of refusing to let hate cloud dreams of
“girls can’t do physics”
And “boys can’t dance”
Because I was raised in a world where Barbie dolls told me “math was hard”
Where GI Joes were macho and inadequate in more ways than one,
And Rosalind Franklin was forgotten because she was a woman

So I want a girl who can change the world with
The poise of waitresses who balance
broken plates and forgotten tabs
Like a double order of insecurity

Can rise the next day with determination
wiping under eye circles away
Because sexy is changing the world as an everyday person

So I want you like change craves revolutionaries
Unconventional dedication singing hope as its bedtime story
Glory personified in the form of genuine passion
And love like math speaking lyrically