Violet Bent Backwards Over the Grass

by Lana Del Rey

May my eyes always stay level to the horizon may they never gaze as high as heaven to ask why

if i could become my own navigator- a captain of the sky that perhaps i could stop looking for direction- from you.

Not tactfully and not gently the instructor shook his head and without looking at me said, “you don’t trust yourself.” I was horrified. Feeling as though I had somehow been found out. Like he knew me- how weak i was

“It’s not that you don’t trust yourself,” he said. “It’s simply that you’re not a captain. It isn’t what you do.”

Because captains aren’t like poets they don’t make metaphors between the sea and sky. And as I thought that to myself I realized- that’s why I write.

All of this circumnavigating the earth was to get back to my life 6 trips to the moon for my poetry to arise I’m not a captain I’m not a pilot I write I write.

You’re only as happy as your least happy child

if u let me be myself u will be the first one who ever did.

You said your mother was dying and you couldn’t fathom your life without a woman in it. I was tempted but it didn’t seem like a good enough offer I wanted more than that even though I’ve never had anything.

to live is to kill