blooming amongst the rubble

Butterscotch and fine things

Doesn’t know what they mean anymore

Her grandmother’s house reeks of death and morphine

Hospice house, her uncle declared before he shot himself dead

Sick in the head, mad in their beds, the neighborhood children cry

And sometimes she thinks they’re right

Right about her, right about where the stains in the bed of the pickup truck came from

The best nights are found in the worst of times

So she’s off laughing in the subway and crying in Central Park

And partying alone in the Hamptons in a full loft that costs more than her tuition

She leaves the home that doesn't love her, doesn't acknowledge her

For the city that could care less whether she lives or dies

The city that doesn't care how long she's staying because she's just another wandering soul

She asks Zeus to strike her down because the only god she believes in is unfair and malicious

Isn’t that fitting? She’s bitter like sour hard candy

Incomplete like peanut butter sandwiches with the crusts cut off

Better things come after suffering is had, her father tells her

While he groans over budgets and turns a blind eye to the injustice around them

There isn't enough money in the world to cure its problems, Jolene, he says

But sometimes she thinks money is the problem

And even if he had money, he wouldn't spend it on anything but whiskey

She’s marching in June and sucking down superiority like cotton candy come July

Her ego needs a boost every once in a while

Red duct tape lining her soles, bleeding sacrificial imprints on every sidewalk crack

She cherishes the stains because at least something will remain when she is gone

Other than a half finished Magnum Opus and a bottle of perfume that smells like home

She still drops daisies at the cathedral, pretends at least someone watches over her

Still visits her mother’s grave every other month, lays down lilies in a clustered heap

Swipes a thin film of battle armor on her cheeks in the morning

Remembers how death is a fickle thing

How it comes for everyone and she doesn’t want to be next