TIL

I learned that hispanic women call me "lady" and old women call me "sweetheart,"

to young men I'm "miss" and to old men I'm "young lady"

The lady across the street calls me "darling" and my mom only calls me on weekends

I have a lot of people who call me "friend,"
and a couple who think I'm "the best,"

sometimes I'm "sister" and sometimes I'm "girl,"

When I'm joking I call myself "homie"

and I never really understood when you called me "dude" 

Today I learned that I shrug off the good names, 

shy away from respect,

dance with casual titles and sip raspberry tea with generalities

Today I learned that I'm hiding behind your name

hiding behind a phone call

I think you deserve more.

fast words nonsense and instability

I try to look past the ocean under my surface,
trying to hide it,
it's more than an ocean,
it's waves crashing down on jagged rocks
they can't catch each other,
a spinning whirly-gig that your eyes can't focus on,
my body jittering at such high speeds that it gives the illusion of something
bigger, something stiller,
something solid,
but try to touch and you'll feel nothing but vibration,
your hand slipping through my cheek like
the junior mints in my popcorn
lost until you get to the bottom of it
except there's no container
and it's infinity kernels,
infinity depth,
infinity loss of chocolate mints
and I'm begging you to contain me
but I think you like my chaos,
the angry clouds of dust building in my vision
and pushing me further to a chasm,
pieces of me smeared on the pavement
sidewalk chalk melted by the hose and hot sunshine
I'm so transparent
I'm so unstable
Nobody can hold onto me
because I'm everywhere at once
drowning myself with my own contents
my particles pulsing at an atomic rate
This isn't what you think it is.