teenagers make themselves gods

 So I wrote this poem in high school. Started it when I was sixteen, finished it sometime when I was eighteen. It's not like, mind blowing, but I still think they're something to it; I recently was going through old documents and found it. So I am going to post it here. I am hoping the formatting will resolve itself once this publishes.

teenagers make themselves gods 

OR

I Tried To Fall In Love With You But All I Got Was A Ruined Orgasm In the Back Of Your Car 

And Another Blocked Number

OR

A Rather Pleading Autobiographical Account of the Past Four Years

I.

of writhing morality that has every 14 year old popping pills at 4 am

of chapstick stained lips and dirty shoes

of falling into the endless dynamo of essays and fake doctor’s notes and condom wrappers

on the floor of the car

of the stuff in a 14 year old’s class-mandated poetry

listen to it, 

sadness creeps earlier 

and earlier

of blurred lips pressing together under a black bar

of ecstasy under cream and lilac sheets

when you learned that abuse and love are similar only if you let it 

(that’s the hard part)

in learning that hangover cures don’t always work

in crediting makeup, not a diet, to wearing shorts again

of something like friendship between the lines in notebook paper 

of something even more like love on phone lines and text messages 

in watching something grow from four years of hatred and self love

they call it maturity

II.

if I could think for a moment

that my self prescribed doomsday 

that the tell tale caress of red 

over the cloudy, darkened horizon

is not aligned with the shaking of my flesh

because cold air is more welcome on my skin than human touch may ever be

then I was 15

he asked me which drawer held my underwear

and i tried to control my rage 

as the only thing tumbling from my windpipe was

“no one knows where my neighborhood is anyway”

most do not notice 

the glitter in the dirt

or that the heat radiating from my hollow cheeks 

is the most human thing about me 

I held Atlas’ head in my lap

I ran his hair through my fingers

and I asked,

“How does it feel to be the one every poet writes of?”

they will write epics on the way our eyes change in the light

ancient religions speak of the revelry 

when my skin brushes another’s

how and when we collide like adulterers in the daytime:

moving too fast

loving too much

the dark caress of pale lips

against sunlight dappled skin

half suppressed shivers of delight 

tender sweet nothings whispered into fluttered shut lashes

hot breath, cool fingers

wound in hair

tracing age lines of the not yet deceased

the smell of cologne mixed with cold breath

they call it the misguidance of youth

III.

teenagers make themselves gods

praying to each other to put pieces back together

i am 90% pills and 5% the way i feel when people tell me 

my hair looks good

even when it doesn’t but they tell me it does because its blue

and they're too scared to dye their own hair

the other 5% is how many times i’ve masturbated in the past two weeks

there is nothing wrong in breaking

wrenching apart the ground 

staining bathroom tiles and dirty socks and perfume bottles

with tears and blood and something that tastes like starting over

sobbing with someone else’s hand in your hair 

(don’t let that be the part you regret)

and there’s a number i have memorized but have never called:

1.800.334.2836 

is the phone number for the Georgia domestic abuse hotline

two years later there is radiance where a boy thought he could take it away

because resilience is not about bouncing back

but screaming and not caring if anyone screams back

I know every other kid writes a suicide note for their poetry assignment but honestly

sometimes it isn’t worth it

sometimes I spend winter break with my lips pressed against someone else’s

(i wish they were yours)

watch their rise and fall

in the face of scrutiny and disarray 

who else to tell tales of us but ourselves

and vow to the cosmos and the void 

not only in endless space but in each other

I will be the stardust in their last sigh

the toxin in their first scream

I am eternal

I am Everything

and I am Nothing because

how else

how else

will they pray to my unforgiving soul when

everything is so dark

so dark

they call that growing up