Happiness across an ocean

I'm sitting on a windowsill, a downward slant thirty feet above pavement. The muscles in my legs pull me back toward the bedroom, self-preservation kicking in to keep me alive one more night, another day to cross my fingers and hope my head's on straight. There's so much beauty around me, there's so much I haven't seen, there's so much I've been a part of lately but I'm looking at the sky on the other side of the world and trying to convince myself I deserve to be here.
I'm sitting on a windowsill, with my feet hanging over the edge, and I feel the nerves traveling through my toes telling me to go back inside, drink more wine, go to sleep and think about it tomorrow, but it's always a sudden tomorrow and I'm still on the edge and I wonder when I won't be.

skin

The bumps along my arm aren’t due to the weather, 

they’re braille pages of panic and disrepair, 

bubbling to the surface. 

For every weightless smile of pride, 

there’s a ten-ton look of disappointment. 

For every good deed, 

there’s punishment. 

These bumps along my arm are scattered braille sentences, 

stolen from the book of blind heredity, 

and I’m ready to retreat. 

For every sun-scratched line, 

there’s burning anxiety, 

trapped in someone else’s pastime. 

My jaw aches from chemicals 

dissolved in the throes of stupidity, 

in the name of chasing escape 

and ignoring my blood rising to the surface. 

Pretend I can’t see the frustration in your eyes,

close my own and read the future on my forearm.

Summer

You can see the heat through the window, the way the blades of grass vibrate in the wind, signaling satellites and waiting for a savior. Waiting for the water to keep their youth, push away the inevitability of decay, feed the future. The tall ones huddle in tiny clusters, recognizing their importance over the stubs, but yielding to the choking presence of beautiful weeds. There is a hierarchy in everything, the only variable is the violence required to establish it.