pour one for the heart inside your chest another for the words you haven't said yet your brain has your tongue in a sleeper hold in 23 years you've never felt so bold to say i've been dreaming, it's mine crushing your glass til the blood seeps through the worry and fear is written all over you your tongue has your heart swinging from a noose sigh, what's a girl to do? to say i've been dreaming, it's time pour one for your friends inside your head "sante", "merci", the next round's on them pour one for yourself to wrestle your tongue loose blood, running thin in your veins, feels new choose to stay dreaming, it's fine and i’m wondering who you are leaning out of the backseat of your car and i’m wondering where i’ll lay my head tonight i'm wondering who you are blacked out in the backseat of your car i'm wondering why i left my head behind and i’m wondering where i am the sun burning my skin and i’m wondering where i'll lay my head tonight

we left the bodies by the road found them buried in snow we were circled by a pack of hungry dogs trying to make a run for the shore gray water meeting grayer skies children floating like dead mines leave them to the dogs and all of their rotted teeth oh, no burden on my mind i had a dream about constanţa i was face down in the black sea caught between the wolves prowling the shoreline and the rolling fog above me pull my body from the sea brush the salt off of me beneath a crumbling skyline monuments to better times bent and rusted, pelted by the tides oh, no burden on my mind to leave the stragglers behind for the dogs, curled up, in my sleep i had a dream about constanţa i was floating in the black sea caught between the wolves prowling the shoreline and the rolling fog above me we left the bodies by the side of the road for the dogs, for the dogs freezing their aching bones we find another one buried in snow oh the dogs, oh the dogs how could we have known?

drift into my head calmly make your nest hold my eyes shut so i can’t escape gone in the morning leave no trace again alone in a sea with a bottle and a creed set them adrift with you see if they can float apart from memories we were barely kids lost in the woods again breadcrumbs in the dark leading back to where you stand or maybe to the water, dip my head in and set me adrift with you see if we can float apart

from the window of a train desolation and urban decay pass in crumbling waves i'm staring emptily the people staring back their faces always look the same though the towns and seasons change their empty gaze is unfazed by my calls their names are all i know i lose the rest under my breath, lost in the city, in my head i dream of wilderness but in the wild, long for the city's filth rusting trains, a crumbling bridge an empty road with the engine revved beside a freeway overpass lies a huntress with my scent lying quietly in the weeds until the grass bears her shape permanently i hear her calls my name is all she knows on the road i can feel her breathing down my neck or is it the wind across my face? i close my eyes, let my mind fade spent years sprawled across her chest took her heart apart, skinned herself alive julia wore her mind like a fur coat in the corners of her chest i'd carve a cave to build my nest suck the marrow from her bones stamp my name across her hands julia condensed her dark thoughts into poems: i've been dreaming of her chest eat her heart, cherish the rest pour a glass, toast her health "to julia" from the window of a train i watch the city limits fade let one more summer pass place a winter in its stead i dig my hands into my coat shield my face from the wind and snow let nature hide my tracks keep my back to the frozen road on a dark mountainside find a cave and build my home look down on the city lights build a fire and waste the night on a dark mountainside send my smoke into the sky let her name cross my lips close my eyes, remember her kiss on a dark mountainside let the wind carry my cries let the smoke signal my needs send all my dreams to sleep but i still hear her calls she can't hear my response: "julia" under my breath, lost in the city, in my head

(the whiskey might make you feel better if it doesn’t kill you first) (long-lost convictions and unfilled prescriptions) (yellowed in the bottom of your purse) (with your distrust of science, and long-believed lies of your lover) (you can’t tell what’s worse) (a life with no sadness or a life with no end) laying in the backseat you were drunk and dreaming thoughts leaking from your fractured head blood stains on the seat of your smoldering compact the air reeking of spilt coffee and cigarettes with tears drenching your phone shorting the transistors you were petrified, lost, lonely, loathsome when that brutal last call goes through and i hear you breathing the memories become too much to bear: on a warm august night i took a drive with one hand holding my head trying to keep my thoughts in the other gripping the wheel with white knuckles desperately trying to live through the next turn i drank the last whiskey from an old bottle and cast it aside through the open window imagine the broken glass slash your tires and your desperate pursuit ends in a twisted wreckage but when i pull your body from the shattered glass there's only one thing that i can say... how many others could you have known? how many others would you have followed home? how many others could you have known? how many others could i have driven home? from the radio the static drips so slowly that i may as well ignore the droning signals penetrating the bare surface of my brain as i stand locked outside in the cold by all of the summer girls whose grins and tans i just can’t bear so i’ll drive to some cold beach where the tide will freeze my blood inside my veins and let my body die; soaking wet and oxygen deprived and i will lie and wait for my brain to forget all my failed tries at being happy and at home but i’m compelled to be alone the only thing i’ve never known but with all the wrong predictions to lead me across all of the right roads into your open arms i’ll crawl to cry these last few days away and i don’t say these things because i think you need my sympathy so, darling, just hold me near but your brutal last call replays in my scarred memory endlessly i know i long to join you with my fingers tangled in your golden curls i hear the sirens wail engulfed by crunching steel against stone and i’m laying in your nest i can smell it on your breath the word i never should have left: “home.”

she was a saint, she was a common tool lying hopeless and waiting for use beneath her crossed arms lay a golden rule to be a saint, what’s a girl to do? she was a saint, she was a precious jewel lying weary and wasting her youth beneath her sorrow lay a perfect soul to be a saint, what’s a girl to do? what’s another night in the stacks? another hour, find an answer to that, i guess leave her number scrawled into the index poet collections: browning, shelley, plath what's another night in the sack? a half an hour to convince herself of that “what’s in it for me? can i carry your wristlet?" “i live right by here.” no, it hasn’t happened yet "i live right by here." NO, IT HASN’T HAPPENED YET another hour, ask again, gently undress leave her number scrawled into the index her mind turning: poetry, undress she could never believe you if you won't trust her at all she could never believe in anything like you at all you would never believe her if you can't see her at all you would never believe in anything but you at all she would never believe you if you said you were not lost she would never believe in you

i left you a voicemail: "fuck, i miss you" i swore off your name, removed it from my mind but two days later i pulled up outside of your old home and i tried your front door... it was open buried inside beneath the dust were 16 years of skeletons so i cleaned your closet in a daze you know, the mess had always bothered me then I stepped back outside with my head down searching for a thought like metal on the shore but two days later, crying in my room with the shades drawn i imagine i am resting with you buried beneath the dirt and grime now i'm lost inside my own mind where we're climbing the ladder to the roof of our old boarding school with some paper cups and a box of wine too little cares, and too much time i run my fingers through your hair i feel your breath warm my neck then i climb back downstairs with my arms cold your memory a blur; your voice miles away two seconds later i wake up inside of my own room and i know that i have to follow you and hide beneath the dust feel it filling up my lungs feel the wind running through my hair feel it filling up my lungs (let's get lost on the wrong side of sin) (i couldn't tell you where that line begins) (but the end is clear) i don't know why the other side of myself keeps me waiting but i hold it dear and close, but never safe i keep it locked down and sober wait until it boils over into my head dead two days later so i choose to dream and leave it alone the end is something that i'll never know have one more drink but this time alone leave everything to the imagination I'LL SIT AND WATCH THE WORLD PASS ME BY JUST HOLDING ON TO THE IDEA THAT I'M ALIVE BUT WHAT IS LIVING IF NOT A CHANCE TO DIE