any house could be a home,
they said, but
you made me believe it.
all my other tenants,
“ah but the windows don’t catch the
evening light the way i like it,”
“the floorboards creak and
cry in protest when i walk,
“don’t you just wish the walls
were painted some lovely color?”
you waltzed into the front door,
drew back the curtains,
peeked beneath the soft carpets,
ran gentle fingers over dusty walls,
“what a beautiful home,
might i stay?”
Category: Personal
pollen.
how much I want,
most days,
to find a safe hole
to crawl into.
find a comfortable
position
and stay there until
the snow traps me in
and I awake in the Spring
reborn, unfurling,
like a flower whose
existence has only
quiet, graceful joy
to offer.
little house.
what am I?
but that which is made
of parts, and parts,
and parts,
which even in a whole
cannot define for itself
the space it occupies,
nor purpose therein.
assembled as
may be the plans,
which laid down the
architecture of my soul,
I could not scale the walls,
but only dream of floors
and the vague idea
of ceilings.
structure of wit, and
senseless being,
of lofty thoughts and
unmet ideals.
the foundation
did crumble upon itself
and somehow
sustain throughout wreckage,
the silhouette of home,
undefined and wavering,
through flood and
assaulting winds.
inside.
I want to be a singing ghost inside your whispered dream,
unremembered and unrepentant in the bright light of morning.
I want to be a sighing monster in your darkened closet,
rustling through old clothes and old memories you’ve packed silent.
I want to be a reflection in your fogging bathroom mirror,
where you write a message in the water and wait for a response,
I want to be the closing statement to your last eulogy,
the final sentiment imparted upon the world you’ve loved.
I want to be the opening to your always, always closing,
I don’t want to be the thing you left behind.
sing-a-long.
you but merely smiled,
and I tripped over the curve of your cheek,
fell into the breath you exhaled,
sighing your sweetness onto my gracelessness.
your laughter like a song,
I danced my clumsy feet along its rhythm,
tried to find the tempo in my racing heart,
to worship you in movement.
you became a lullaby,
and I, a suckling babe,
staring upward into your heavens,
my heart begging to join your dreams.
bloom.
with your fingers,
you sowed seeds in my skin,
and like that, I became a garden
from which flowers grew
under summer rain.
now, though it is winter,
and I wither, and I sleep,
I know your palms hold safe
the sun which you give
each day to me in silence.
wilderness.
how I would have followed you with quilted roses
to the secret hidden spaces where we lied
under thick blankets of darkness
chilled and frenzied, dreamland of icy fire
how I would have hung your name about the stars
wrapped in willow branches and children’s hymns
swaying sweetly in the sighing breeze of thunder
quiet and crashing, solace in my heart of ire
how I would have found you in the mountains
crouched and creeping daisies in your hair
whispering faerie tales to the dead trees of winter
still and dancing, a tune on lovers’ lyre
how I would have handed you forever
could I just have found the time
slipping past the seconds, and the moments, all the miles
forgotten silken hours, threadbare hanging from the walls of memory
how I could have loved your tameness, had I been not wild and free
pennies.
she jingles when she walks,
a pocket full of unanswered questions,
like a lifetime of spare change;
collected from passing strangers,
unremarkable faces in the grocery store.
she’s keeping time with the rhythm
of the beep, beep, beep of traffic
passing on the street;
impatient, and tragically slow like
sneakers on cracked sidewalks.
how far can these paths take
a girl with a fractured story,
where does the road lead to home?
a journey along the precipice
of a story no longer known.
repetition.
saying that there is love out there for everyone, is like saying that every star is a part of a constellation
when the truth is that some of us were just born, ignited, without close proximity to anyone who could see us shining.
and don’t you dare tell me that every cloud has a silver lining, because I’ve looked at the sun until it hurt my eyes, and blinded me for days,
and yet still, I could cry, and it didn’t matter that there wasn’t any rain.
don’t you tell me that things get better with time because I’ve counted the sand in my hourglass,
time after time, 30 minute intervals turned to days and turned to weeks and months,
just turning it over and over to see how much it took.
but when I sat it back on the shelf and resumed my place in line,
turned out that nothing was different and the hurts were still mine.
(an open poem to 14-year-old me)
dearest girl,
with your name brand jeans
and perfectly styled “average” hair,
over-plucked eyebrows,
and desperately swinging hips.
please listen to me.
i remember you.
the boy who broke your heart last week,
who made you feel
unimportant,
forgotten,
irrelevant,
small,
and young.
in six years, he will beg your forgiveness,
and you will kindly remind yourself
that you’re better now,
and he will continue on his sad road.
you will change your mind about children,
and the two you bear will be your world.
they will frustrate you,
and the journey to a professional career
will be all the harder,
but every day you will thank your womb
for their laughter,
and the sparkle in their eyes
when they come to you for goodnight kisses,
and sing you songs,
and draw pictures of you together,
which will hang on the fridge,
and on your heart.
your parents will age,
and you will wish that you’d been better.
you will wish you’d been less bitter,
and you’ll understand their concern,
their need for authority,
their attempt to control,
to save you.
you will love them,
and they will still love you,
and for now, you still have time to make up
for all the times you screamed “i hate you”
at the top of your lungs.
you will fall in love,
and you will break your own heart,
and in some ways,
you’ll heal,
but you’ve long forgotten
the other hands who touched you,
and the reasons why you ever thought they
were important anyway.
you’ve learned that your body
is more than just their playground,
and you’ve repainted a few things,
planted seeds,
and learned to love yourself.
you don’t hurt yourself anymore,
and you do your best to help people who
haven’t gotten that far yet.
you have bad days,
and you have good days,
and you have days which feel like nothing at all,
but you’re always moving forward,
even if it just means lying still.
i still have some of the things you wrote,
and i look at them sometimes,
and i see how much we’ve grown.
and i see you sneaking through windows,
to sit under the moon and write about
how sad it is, and how wrong it is,
and how nothing ever seemed to go right.
and i want you to know that it never
just magically starts being perfect.
life has a strange way of never really
doing that.
but you learn to be strong,
and you learn to be yourself,
and you learn to forgive,
and you learn to change, when needed,
and how to walk away.
and i am proud of you,
because we have come so far.
iamwhatshewrote 