Rubik's cube night.

my breath smells like tuna fish
 and he doesn't care.
He leans in and places the softest kiss on my lips
  like placing an artifact on the coffee table,
  like falling into a dream

 and tells me never to doubt that he loves me.
never to doubt that the stars wake up every morning for me
and the skin on my bones breathes because I deserve it
He tells me that no amount of tuna fish
or showerless days
or past tense secrets
could make me any less lovable.

He tells me I'm irristable.
 and he kisses me again

Sunshine

I wrote 'funeral - 11 am' at the top of my planner.

I couldn't write the name.

And 11 am didn't write his name either.
It wrote his personality and his gift and his hair,
oh that hair.
It was the casket and the attire and the program—
They screamed his name,    so we didn't have to.

Because no one should have to bury a little brother.

The choir left his space
and Spencer couldn't speak

and Chan did the missionary thing

No one should have to bury their little brother.

The Suits in the graveyard 

The cemetery packed with tears and tributes.

    God, this a warrior.

The car alarm that let us know Hunter attended his own funeral.
The man who couldn't let go of the casket.
And the way they stood together, like a broken family, missing the last thing they called home.

And they buried their little brother.

At 11 am the entire high school showed up to say goodbye to what they'd become.
but they haven't dug up the graves that line the lockers, yet.
They say he was depressed,
and they'll keep saying it to make themselves feel better.
Just more medicine that doesn't treat the right problem.
headaches on innocent minds that don't want an acceptance letter to the next four years.

We buried their little brother.

Go back to the support on a Sunday night
   paired with the mother who sobbed into a sharpie signed condolence.
Or jump ahead to the father with stress centered conversation the first week of December
   paired with a comment about ward choir and baked potatoes.



There's a Christmas tree going up in the Dahl home.
And they'd like anyone to bring by an ornament that represents him or simply a memory.
And with that hair,
 I expect all of you there.

They need us now more than ever.

Silent Car Rides

You're busy admiring the leaves today, forgetting they're not the only ones dropping in the cold.

You didn't see the chapel scraping to fill halfway,
                                            or the heartbreak of people smiling through tears.


There's something morbid about little girls in a graveyard.
Something about pink sweaters against pale bodies and taking roses to take them,
                                                                                                              not to put them on the casket.

I've seen too many funerals in my 18 short years.
The first time I met death was at 7 years old:
and here I thought I paid my dues.

but the painful decay of a hospital is something I haven't learned to deal with,
and I think God will keep giving me silence filled Emergency rooms, until I learn.

the florescent fish in the hallway are the only things that look remotely happy,
but if you take a closer peek, you'll see they're just as miserable as the rest of us.
Cooped up like prisoners in this clown house of grief

Shiny floors and green flashes of life and death. life and death.

 life and death.

Oxygen monitors. Complimentary cheese cubes.
                                                              Questions and prayers that God can't answer.

If you think your few months of college have seasoned you into adulthood,
wait until you hit the grill.

In Loving Memory 

- Jones Kay Christensen -

Cafeteria food

Downturned eyes and fidgeting hands,
pulling at the edge of your shirt to look busy.
Everytime I see bodies who don't fit the media's definition of thin
I worry that I'm seeing people who don't believe they are beautiful.
Who don't believe they are talented, strong, wonderful.

The lies we post on walls across America are starting to tell lies of their own.
Big eyes and a big heart hear mixed messages from a size 0 rack.
Little girls are painting pictures of what shouldn't be there instead of what is.
Little girls who don't believe they are beautiful.
Who don't believe that they should grow up to be big and strong.

Clocks tick like seconds are ants scurrying for crumbs
and we're not doing anything about it.
Crumbs are all anyone eats anymore.
Teenage girls who don't believe they are beautiful.
Who don't feel pretty in a prom dress or a profile picture.

Shifty comments and watery eyes,
They have to believe they are beautiful.
Paper dolls with paper thin waists plaster their pictures across the news
The runway can be so much worse than a plane crash
.