claustrophobia at the beach

a book of poetry by jesse major

“birthday problem”

i made you a cake that said

“i’m sorry i didn’t overdose”

i know you would have loved that

i’m blowing out all the candles

a few for all the times i failed

and a few more for all the times you did too

we are a perfect match

but you were too blind to see

i can’t guide you through this life

but i know the afterlife all too well because i see it in my dreams

listening to you fuck

where we once made love

keeping my mouth shut

with heaven behind my eyes

“i’m sorry you didn’t die”

is all i wanted to hear

but i don’t make you happy

love is a dead language

and trust is fabrication

all emotions are accidents

so everything is temporary

happy birthday

“pill count”

i finally stopped grinding my teeth about a week after i left

so long, and thanks for all the trauma

i can’t say thank you enough

for breaking my heart

because i now know how to love

knowing i can never get hurt again

piece by piece

stitch by stitch

i used to count all the threads of your being

and now i’m using them to sew myself back up again

the one person i thought i couldn’t live without

is now the one person i don’t want around

“syphilis”

“ghosts”

i can’t rely on anything but ghosts

to keep me company

a choir of noise

but all i hear is beauty

i wish i was dead

so i can join in on the harmony

i expect dissonant fucking

but get lovemaking going on behind me

just another scene

quiet on the set

i say to myself

as i try to overdose in her bed

she walks in the room to grab a colouring

book

or a puzzle

i forget

i hope all that the colours make sense

or that the pieces fit

this is where you unthaw the nightmare

and i haven’t dreamt since

everything can be so perfect

if you weren’t so heartless

"404 page not found"

this life has been a shark bite held on ice

an emergency contact that won’t pick up

i bled so much

that it’s almost art

so dry your red eyes and look into my heart you’ll see that i am not brilliant just a lush that knows too much

our bodies once made love but only

god knows the meaning of “fuck”

i’m so sorry you’re turning the pages

with bloody fingers

it’s not my fault

you’ve been

playing angel when you’re just a sinner

and i’ve been holding oceans with broken hands disguised as a swimmer

but i know nothing about saving lives

except

keep breathing

“fuck to june”

you saw butterflies explode from my throat

while we were talking about our dream home

you knew perfect accidents all too well

but your friends and i had no idea

you said

“it’s this or bees”

but we all die after we leave

whether it’s self harm or accidentally

i just hope i get used to this feeling

wrap yourself in your own arms

because i can’t anymore

i’m not an excuse

for why you’re so lonely

i once saw you as a butterfly

and now you’re just a bee

you left

and this fucking stings

“will”

“overdosing at a christmas party while your fiancé is eating salad. the only reason you’re invited back is because last time you didn’t die. now i hate salad”

i tried to overdose late last year

just for something to talk about

at the christmas party i wish i wasn’t at

no one here seems to relate

and i can see the red line quietly fade

so you watched me in the corner of the room

comparing myself to everyone i hate

and i see so many similarities

“god is a girl that i’ve already fucked but she won’t call me back because i stole pills out of her purse”

i know a stolen breath of fresh air when i hear one

and i can’t tell if you feel bad or if there’s just a gun to your head

by god with a gun to hers

well i have a knife in my chest

so maybe we can still be friends

i’m sorry she didn’t pull the trigger

and i’m sure as hell you’re not sorry

you didn’t stab deeper

“smooth jazz”

glossing over the fact

that i am fucking withdrawing

you asked “how have you been?”

my only response was grinding my teeth

it didn’t stop you from putting your tongue

in my mouth

and for a moment

it felt like smooth jazz

“kill”

“cum”

i didn’t have time to think about a new years kiss

i was too busy nursing my insecurities

i can’t fuck

let alone make out at midnight

i can’t cum

without feeling like shit

“i’m having a panic attack reading this poem but i want to call it “happy new year”"

why are you so pretty?

she said as she touched my face

it’s not my fault but it’s fucking exhausting

“rollercoaster. like the movie except not like the movie. or maybe like the movie”

i’m always drunk

and i don’t stop talking

about how my mind is

brilliant

she is so tired

of my voice

but it helps her fall asleep

because it’s what she knows

we’ll probably have a baby

and we’re both stressed

but if it gives us something

to think about

well then

we can swallow all the pills

and jump

into the nothingness

you can find us

laying in the afterlife

and explain to the baby

that her parents

were brilliant

just watch the movie

rollercoaster

i’m sorry, cordellia

but we moved too fast

what a tragedy

“blank page”

“everyone keeps saying i’m going back to the crime scene but i think i’m going back to the gates of heaven. same thing”

i asked her to have a baby

while we fucked

months after she ripped my heart out

an ambulance delivers me

back to the crime scene

but it’s better than the hospital

in 9 months

the waiting room smells like regret

“apple”

went to eat an apple in the dark

turns out it was a lightbulb

“chapped lips”

biting the lip of the afterlife

i’m just stopping in half naked to say hi

i don’t know which is sharper

the way i’m dressed

or

the teeth that bite back

i also don’t know which is worse

the fact that my lips aren’t chapped

after

so many encounters

with death

or

the fact that i’m not dead

“vomit.jpeg”

you count the times you throw up

because you’re so OCD

counting all the letters in bulimic

as you lock the door 7 times

and ask me not to leave

she says every day feels like sunday

under a breath

heavier than my will to breathe

you’re so empty now

emotionally and physically

so go back to square one

and count backwards

from the day you fell out of love

to the day you loved me

“claustrophobia at the beach”

the sky fell with words attached

claustrophobia at the beach

suicide watch with the girl of my dreams

swimming in the irony

the ocean is tied around my neck

i’m fucking drowning

no one rolls their eyes to the right

it’s always the left

i might have to drown myself

because there’s a shark coming

and she’s looking for blood

i grinded my teeth too much to the point where they bled

so i think i’m fucked

she found me

bleeding at the bottom of the lake

my limbs arrive ashore washing all the sand castles away

find parts of me at the beach

i couldn’t even swim

but i took the risk

the lifeguard

his name is irony

“the banker is also a lifeguard but he doesn’t tell anyone”

the universe

gives us a loan

i’ll pay it back

with my dead body

“9/ we both hate that number”

i fell more in love

after you broke my heart

i can’t stop shaking

when i think of you

or crying when we still fuck

you watched me have 9 panic attacks

because i have to leave

but i only live down the street

you ruined my dick

“blind potential”

i saw a potential car crash today

and then a drug deal beside the bank

never 2 without 3

so then i watched a man smoke meth

on facebook video chat

“cum pt. 2”

we stole the cum right out of each other

it went to waste

and we will never get that back

“polaroid”

i had a dream i watched people die

every night for the past 27 nights

i saw everyone get ripped apart

while i was holding my favourite dog

i also saw a car run off a bridge

i wonder who was driving so i can

send my apologies to their family

i took a polaroid

so when i woke up

and show all my friends

maybe they’ll believe me

that trauma is so easy

but dreaming isn’t

i woke up in a lucid state

i shook my head but woke up lucid in

my bed again

i may have died

and i’m on a polaroid

somewhere

on the cement covered in blood

or the bottom of the lake

in a car

just send apologies

to my family

i hope i never dream again

“fever dream”

i haven’t felt the same

since the last time i fingered you

like some fever dream in a movie

you’re high again

but you can agree

cleaning the mold off the handgun

"so help me god"

she says with a finger on the trigger

but she seems disgusted with herself

when she sees the blood on my fingers

does it really have to be this way?

it does until we make changes

duck duck goose

patting me on my head

"good boy"

i just wish i never met you because i’ll never feel the same again

“i read this to the love of my life and she laughed”

a jar of flowers i keep

i don’t know why

they’re dead inside

i guess it’s a reminder

that i am too

we will never see each other bloom “latendresse”

i proposed to a french woman

6 days after meeting her

she cried and called her friends and

family

i didn’t want anyone to know

about the impulse

i just made

so i shrugged

and said

maybe next week

“dotty”

tearing this map in two

maybe the stars will align

let’s find our way back home take your half and we can put it back together

i have so much to say but it gets me nowhere

the dotted lines

carved into

misled direction only leads us to separate places i haven’t seen you since that sunday and god, do i miss that face

“songs about tragedy”

i only see the sun in photographs but i only smile when it’s cold outside you said

you’re such a contradiction you found me drawing pictures of things i miss like the sun and birds they were singing songs about tragedy just like i used to i also found old pictures of you and me my arms were sunburnt and you looked so lonely i remember you saying

i miss you but it was all fantasy because in a perfect world you loved me and just like that i became a memory you say you miss the sun but you never went outside you said you miss my voice but you never called i can only be this liminal space you say you love but you don’t accept heartbreak and you don’t even try i’ve seen you at your worst drawing the sun and pictures of birds you imagined our life but it was all fantasy you found me drawing pictures of home my arms were so cold i forgot to draw the sun but i remembered the birds they were singing all the songs you used to sing to me songs about tragedy

“mother”

with my luck

i’ll die

on the phone

with my mother “who is this ghost at my birthday party?” bursting pretty balloons inside of your head and i don’t know if we’re smiling for the same reason i know it could all be beautiful if we just stare into the nothing my mind is not beautiful it’s just a heavy burden who is this ghost at my birthday party? i'm just trying to age peacefully but he’s stealing my cake and eating it too

“cordelia”

remembering is impossible

because we moved too fast

i don’t have time to think

because by the time i do

something new happens

she always hated that i repeat myself

i love her but i loved her to death

it’s forgetting all the pain

and then doing it all over again

the definition of insanity

i missed 1000 times

it’s the hospital needle marks

and missing the fix

i fucking hate this

if i can be honest

being tethered to someone

you can’t be with

is like heaven arguing with hell

just for the sake of contradiction

i once held purgatory

in my hands

heaven on the right and hell on the left

but if i can repeat myself again

i love her but i loved her to death

the string comes undone

a tether ball romantic game of emotional

suicide we both lost “longest dog walk ever”

she asked me if i wanted to go for

a walk with the dogs

2 minutes down the street

she told me she wasn’t happy

i was too in shock

to turn around

so we continued through the forest

for an hour in silence

it was longest dog walk ever “26”

i can feel it hit my bloodstream

i call it hell

but these words create a symphony

i can only sequence 26 letters so many ways to form

an apology

for not living up to your expectations

but once i’m faced with reality

i’m fucking

sorry

all i want is to look into

your mouth to see how you feel inside

but you never opened your mouth

so i had to find out for myself

by looking into your heart

but i find nothing

your guilt ridden eyes

are wanting to agree

but we both know

you’re just lying through your teeth

look into my mouth

and cut me open

slowly

so you can see into my heart

and realize

it only takes 26 minutes

to figure someone out

you forgot to look

only because you’re so blind

we’re too quick to cut

but you can’t even cut properly

refer to “birthday problem” “bees”

i wrote a note that said

i’m sorry

and put a dead bee where the O was

but she didn’t understand why

... because this stings

refer to “fuck to june”

"fucking in french"

she was always disappointed that i never learned french

and now that i'm gone the best revenge i have is

"je t'aime"

“want to see a nosebleed?”

i set arson to my lungs

hallucinations of surviving

we ran away from the fire in my heart

holding hands

you were smiling

still

i can only feel this pain in my chest

for so long

before i end things

and when i do

i hope you put out the fire

just douse it with gasoline

so i can breathe again

i’ll finally be able to see

how living is

and how my lungs burn

when you leave

i thought i’d never see it

she told me to wake up

but i never closed my eyes

so i’m sorry to leave you breathless but you’re not sorry i didn’t die

“bloom”

i’m tired of kissing through sore teeth your tongue vs. my borrowed vocabulary leaving suicide notes between your thighs my head’s a bees nest our hearts bloom when we are breathless

“crying while dancing”

after we fucked

i saw my cum fall out of you onto the floor

and you just laughed

like you always do

there’s something oddly poetic

about someone that doesn’t love you

“keepsake"

no one ever notices that you don't remember pleasure

so we keep chasing it

and no one remembers

that we remember pain

and that just because we find it

we shouldn't keep it like pictures in a shoebox

or empty bottles on the floor “horse gallops of the heartbeat” it’s been snowing so long

i’m so distracted

that i almost forgot that my veins

strangle me

constantly

because the emotional avalanche

buries me

or it’s the ocean and the blood i left behind

i’m drowning

in you and me

you turned so cold

i can’t breathe

when i think of you

you race straight to my heart

horse gallops in the heartbeat

"panic disorder"

in silence

just read this

please

turn all the noise off

fucking

panic disorder

kills me

but it's the only thing keeping me alive

“separation anxiety” you said you wanted space so i got high on myself i am never coming down

“october / a knife fight i can’t remember“

it's getting cold

but i'm not scared

i watched you freeze my nightmares

to unthaw next month

your hand on my back and it felt like a knife

my teeth pressed into your knee

such simple, small, beautiful things but now they’re just memories

blood soaked mouth from biting my tongue

i have so much to say but i’ll drown before i let the words come out

i don't want this pain anymore

but i guess i am too scared to leave

because in all honesty

i wish you would have stabbed me and left me there to bleed refer back to "ghosts"

"christmas"

i woke up alone on christmas at 2pm

had my first wet dream in years “can i smoke in here?” spent months in a grave alone watched my friends fall in love i have no reflection everything is looking up

"je veux voir"

rubbing your face on a dead body

just to feel alive

the joy of feeling sadness je veux voir

"j'ai besoin de voir"

i would find a pair of her glasses and started reading

i don't even need glasses

and i don't even care about reading

but it impressed her and made her feel

like she was living with a new man

now that she's actually gone

i started reading again

except the only difference is she's gone

and i don't have her glasses j'ai besoin de voir “bulimia asmr”

we haven’t spoken in 7 days now

counting all the letters in bulimic

and i’m sick to my fucking stomach

out of the days of the week

you promised you’d never leave me on a sunday

i can’t live with you

and i can’t live without you

so where do i belong?

in a hearse or in your arms

i feel the same

dead inside or held tight

in a pine box refer back to “vomit.jpeg” “once you’re good at something, you’re too old to do it”

i knew a man so bad at multitasking

that he couldn’t breathe while thinking it was one or the other he became ever so tired

and decided he was happier when he didn’t think but he would hold his breath when he wanted to reflect

he forgot about the hourglass in his chest

every day felt like being claustrophobic at the beach

irony wasn’t there to save his life

but one day he got caught up and forgot to breathe

..this man is dead

“it’s only third degree burns”

throwing emotion back and forth wiping tears from each other’s eyes i can’t see the ocean through the cries and you can’t feel the past without pills but i forgive you those dotted lines led me to you or to hell it’s too soon to tell take my hand and lead me to where you think i belong

you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink i can’t stop crying when i remember you exist you don’t stop smiling when you don’t see me around it’s a bullet vs. a knife well, all in all the distance kills put the gun to my head while i’m still holding the knife behind my back hoping i can win by some dumb luck

i’m sorry i bled all over your new shirt i call it art it’s one thing to be in the fire it’s another to step out and look at it remembering is half the battle the other half is living it it’s only third degree burns i’ll survive “a man locked in a room screaming that he has a gun / this isn’t heaven”

it all ends the same

you can die of suicide, cancer, syphilis or bad timing

it doesn’t make a difference you can make excuses but this isn’t heaven

read that poem backwards now “it has to get worse before it gets better” trying to find the humour in all things like you finding me dead in our apartment i think it would have been an ongoing joke

that lasts a life time and the punchline is 6 feet below you keep your ear to the ground “i miss her”

i miss her more than words can explain all of these words mean nothing there is no more joy in this life there won’t be any joy in the next the light in my life has gone out i’ll learn to be content in the dark "black and white french snuff film”

do you ever imagine my fingers inside you after seeing me do simple things with my hands like digging my own grave or shoving my fist down my throat to get a grasp on my lungs to show you that i don’t breathe for you anymore?

“pinky promise” i’m sorry i’m not sorry but i have to leave say it’s all my fault or lie to yourself so many times you believe it

a promise is only a promise until the truth comes clean

intention without accomplishment is only a failure seen in the eyes of others injure yourself for closure

the best stories are the ones you don’t tell

“in harms way”

amputating all possibility

to hear “i love you” ever again silence is a gift

and sometimes we have to regress in order to learn or forget i don’t know why you love me but sometimes a gift can be a regret

i know why i love you and sometimes sadness doesn’t have to be understood

happiness is temporary misery is an excuse so look at your wrist it’ll tell you everything you need to know it reads i love you

“self control in moderation”

she called me a narcissist and so did my mother but empathy takes a grip

on my throat

i like being abused but if i had a gun

i would put it to my head and beg myself not to pull the trigger

"slow dancing with knives"

death is upon us

so let’s dance

or kill me quick

a slow dance or a slow death

the only difference is

how fast i can breathe

grab you by the hips

you grab me by the wrists

your hands are made of knives

let’s slow dance to hell

“blank page”

"stop" fucking my ex fiance sober for once “i need to stop” “i'm too in love”

"me"