zoerutharchive

[zoerutharchive]

#collage #poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Things I've Tried to Alleviate Depression

Sertraline

Lamictal

Lexapro

Blackberry macaroon

Overpriced coffee

Meditation

Klonopin

Xanax

Yoga

Acupuncture

Emotionally unavailable lovers

Cleaning my room

Taking a nap

Taking a walk

Shoplifting

Psychoanalysis

Vodka

Vicodin

Wellbutrin

CBT

DBT

ECT

THC

Trintellix

Mirtazapine

Philosophy

Talk therapy

Boarding school

Treatment center

Loud music

Soft music

Self harm

Self love

Kissing

Crying

Cold shower

#poetry #list poem

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#collage

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[zoerutharchive]

Cut my tongue out my mouth and I will still bleed your name

this body is a tomb, not a temple

the bones are tired.

the flesh is ritual.

the veins run like pipelines

through my dust bowl of 

tender sorrows. old wounds

radiate hot sicknesses

that infect the heart and

set off the geiger counter

shrieking into the sunken night

where phantom hands posess my limbs

and phantom lips berate my thighs

covered in blood. still warm

optimism disemboweled by such

backwards tongue self sabotage

in this scrapyard of psychic junk

you learn to fit to the confines of your cage.

you learn to swallow your rage dry.

the ground is barren. nothing grows here

not even weeds. tree carcasses bend

backwards away from the sun.

something is hiding

behind a vitriolic shroud 

all this time. and so familiar.

narcissists parrot their pain

in this regurgitative graveyard  

the pulse throbs SOS in morse code

strung out led astray. i disintegrate

like a spider web in your palm

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

There is no progress, just circles

I left in the early morning when the sun was still blistering in the sky hiding behind veils of cloud and smog you’ll find in cities commandeered by industry metal monstrosities reaching upwards toward salvation toward the blistering sun glowing and seething and searing a hole in the ether circular like a cigarette burn circular like samsara everything is always dying and being reborn in the wake of yesterday’s blast zone erecting cell towers with your mind or crawling towards some temporary euphoria it’s all a game of circles you speak circles you spit circles you live and die circles you abandon one circle for another because circles are all you know but this is the rise and fall of the chest of it all create destroy live lose there is no progress just circles the day I killed my expectations was the day I floated up and away to a non-heaven without circles

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Chinatown sleepwalk

I ripped the sky open & gardenias grew from the wound

seeping sweetness into the air like pus from a sore

staggering through Chinatown like a zombie

drunk off my own sleep deprivation

the lights all blurred together

painting illusory pictures that

glowed against the nighttime’s stillness

punctured by echoing strings & footsteps.

I wear my dreams like armor

I dream like a wet cat on acid

with my hair raised & my back arched 

& my mind searing technicolor images

of taxis with golden tracers & wet cats 

& paper lanterns lit from within

this is not a funeral march

this is an ode to hypodermic needles &

a lament for the patriots possessed by ancient demons

I take my sadness uptown & transfer at 14th street

christened in piss & metallics

with the sound drowned out by

cannibal daydreams & pig chatter

this is a requiem & a love song & a big fuck you

there is nothing left to lose but your fear

riding razor blades to Venus or

watching spires bruise the skyline

shades of copper & violet

chimneys spitting smoke

from brick mouths

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

The crucifixion

Sitting on a throne of hot coals 

crowned in barbed wire,

my progress

has its hands folded 

in two small piles 

skewered by nails.

He splits open my progress

gently with his thumbs

like a clove of garlic

peeling back the skin

I shed to let him in &

my scent fills the room

where our flesh fused.

When it’s cold he breathes

hot air into my progress

it grows & floats

with the quiet valiance 

of a figurehead

braving crashing waves

my ocean is inside &

my progress is untied

to physics or a cost of living

apprehensive in these evenings

dismembered by pride

I'm not trying to pull teeth

sweet on your contrails

to spite my progress

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Couplets

Your indolence leaves

a sleeve of paper cuts

fuck you

I count death on my fingers

and repudiate sickness

dreaming of gentle violences

I will bend your legs backwards

to coax an apology

from menthol lips

a golden cataclysm

oracles played love songs on

harps strung with intestines

my softness searing sigils

you breathe ice and pentacles

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Sometimes I like being alive, sometimes I don’t

Some nights I dream with my eyes open

and my heart impaled by three drain pipes

some nights I am not a person 

just a fixture on the windowsill 

curled into myself like a gargoyle

watching the world from far away

a fence post choked with vines still stands as a fence post

the moon is always moving around us silently

even when we feel like dying

your suffering isn’t a cypher

my cheeks burn with life

my eyes well with life

my fingers itch with life

my pulse races with life

sometimes I like it 

sometimes I don’t

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Rat King

You are the rat king, bound to your brothers 

walking in spirals and tied at the tail

for all of eternity. When you die,

they’ll put you in a jar 

filled with formaldehyde

and ogle at your collective corpses

speculating some coincidental sickness

and marveling at your condition 

Nobody will leave you flowers

or wonder if it hurt

or if you were scared

or relieved not to die alone;

A rat should eat cheese and scurry.

A rat should not die in a knot.

But nature is indifferent, and

sometimes indifference seems cruel

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Limerence

I want to spend all day lying in the grass

with our limbs tangled like tree roots

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Suicide Garden (for Kurt Cobain)

#collage

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Ectoplasm

I tried to shed the grief but it materialized like an ectoplasm, I coughed it up onto my bathroom floor drunk: a puddle of black goo steaming and writhing when I looked evil in the eyes it slithered and fought against itself like a heap of tangled snakes. I held its gaze until my eyelids grew heavy with memory– we had good times together didn’t we? Four failed exorcisms gave them a run for their money– maybe but I don’t want the good times to leave scars anymore, I told my ectoplasm to pay rent or leave and by the morning it was gone; even evil offput by New York City housing prices

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

I am life and death and everything else

I contain multitudes of nothing unordinary

my edges are serrated

milligrams in the thousands

charred lungs feelings combustible

all stewing in the cesspool

clenching a fistful of weeds like a rosary

with limbs arched overpassing 

forest fires and raging oceans and

meadows bearing wildflowers

in an ode to dead pets

my fingernails caked with dirt

and dandelion milk

I will keep death beneath my tongue until it turns to light

I can make a moment last forever

or rip the stars from the sky and

hold them in my hands like seaglass

my offering for communion

I read your fate line:

I know how you’ll die

how you like to be kissed

what makes your skin crawl

my solipicist sidekick 

speaking with a mouthful of cavities 

I can only try to read your lips

#poetry

[zoerutharchive]

Saturn as a Boy

You spend decapitated nighttimes

walking circles around a dark room

peeling kumquats and waiting

for anger to swallow you up

in the low light of a desk lamp

you unhinge your jaw like a snake

it casts a shadow on the wall

that looks like a congressman

pompous and overcompensating

when you bite down on the sun

those morose fangs crumble 

in impact and awe of what is 

real when one is warm

you are not kind most of the time

twitter fingers atrophying

for what cause?

rage will make an ouroboros out of you

and I’ll clean up the mess

paying my respects

with actions, not words

I sweep you into the pile

#poetry

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#collage