Author: poetryfest

Power to the people
Yo, I put power to the people
Power to the people
Yo, I put power to the people
You already know what the message is
Write my own lines so I’m sensitive
Told them lil’ boys they can’t mess with this
I’m the best at this, you should do less of this
Power to the people, I’m an activist
Baby we are Stars like an asterisk *
We need to annotate where our mental is
All these sentences, but where’s the censorship?
See I got my guard up cause I was scarred up, barred up
In a backwards system I ain’t wanna be apart of
Asking how I break these chains
Oh, let me hang my art up
Ever since I brought up I just seemed to be a target
Feel misplaced with many fakes
What are the stakes? Yo, I’ll hold my weight
Obliterate the old way to re-create
Annihilate to keep it frank
The time is now, no time to wait
You take your rate and leave no change
Don’t want a chain, yo that is lame, not in that lane
Who do we blame? Distorted celebrated fame
And you could keep your mask, I won’t be phased
I like my face, am I in-sane?
Out of body, body died, but soul remained
This my only way let go my pain
I used to hold it in, now can’t contain
I feel release, I see restraint
I empathize cause made mistakes
Externalize my inner states
Free of my inner-weight, revealing fate
Breaking family curses that used to generate
Breaking family curses that used to generate
Breaking family curses that used to generate
Shift, make a new day and then celebrate
You already know what the message is
Write my own lines so I’m sensitive
Told them lil’ boys they can’t mess with this
I’m the best at this, you should do less of this
Power to the people, I’m an activist
Baby we are Stars like an asterisk *
We need to annotate where our mental is
All these sentences, but where’s the censorship?
Power to the people
Yo, I put power to the people
Yo, Power to the people
Yo, I put power to the people
Power to the people
Yo, I put power to the people
Power to the people
Yo, and I put love to the people

That pink hair conditioner
“It’s gone”
And I’m empty
You took my wide-eyed gaze
On a wild ride
Through little European streets
That glowed like starlit starlight
And under lampposts
You taught me how to laugh,
Held me in your arms as I cried
Said we were forever
But forever last for never
Now you don’t call.
Or pick up the phone
And here I am all alone
Where we used to walk
When everything felt safe
And you didn’t want to just be my “European romance”
On that beach or in my bed
Well now I’m driving on a country road
Blasting the radio
Entranced by light pollution
Streetlights against starlight, on powerlines!
I never said that bottle of hair conditioner’s empty
I said “it’s gone” just like you, just like me, just like her—
Oh wait, there’s another her?
Well, how be that?
I saw it coming,
Oh no,
This isn’t my first rodeo
You never even had to say a word
Oh, you didn’t want to hurt me?
Well half-hearted conversations
And one-word replies
Don’t do that
Relationships change
It’s fine.
I gave you the better part of three years
2
But it’s fine
You made me cry in a Meijer’s
But it’s fine
I couldn’t see through the tears
I bought nonalcoholic alcohol
And dairy free Ben and Jerries
But it’s fine
I had to slink into the only beer joint in town
That wouldn’t tell my parents I was buying
And I’m 32!
And it’s all because of you
But it’s fine
I knew you’d move on
I’m so happy for you
I bet she’s great
I bet I’ve seen her pop up a few 100 times
On my Facebook
You two will make such a cute couple!
But did I really have to be the one to say “let’s take a break”
You can’t say petty things about my face
Way to make me hate her when it’s you who made me spit word vomit
Because I don’t care if you’ve moved on
We’re over
Probably my star-spangled banner
Will never meet
Your little European street
Again
I really don’t care.
It just kills me that you moved on first
To be left behind? Below? Forgotten? Erased?
Oh, I draw the line there.
And I don’t even know what you were thinking
Hell, I don’t know what I was thinking
You’re not mine
You’re not for me
I knew that even before you did
I wrote a horror story about you
I wrote a poem about you
It got published!
It was a damn good poem
3
That was our relationship.
So now I’ll just stay drunk in my bed
Writing poetry with a fancy pen
I never drink unelss its fall
But it’s February
And I’m an English major misspelling “unless”
What did it all mean?
The conditioner is gone
Our relationship is gone
Europe is gone
Those puppy dog socks you got me?
Holes
I know it’s the memories that are supposed to matter
But what good are they if they’re enclosed
Compartmentalized
In the sublime past of a substandard life?
Is my open back account
Of foreign currency
Just a practice in futility
Was that all we were?
A means to an end?
Why bother when this was the end?
Drunken, wasted, pointless
As a facial peel in the shower
What hurts the most
Is I already said goodbye
To you as a lover
2 damn times
But you know what they say
Three’s the charm
And it’s okay
My door’s always open
We have birthdays, holidays,
When we see stuff in the grocery store that reminds us of us
But otherwise,
There’s no us.
I’ll put this in math terms for you
You + Her = a nice neat prime number
Her + You Me = a quick mess÷
If that’s too hard
4
Let me put this in English terms
I don’t want to be the antagonist
Of a love story
In which you’re the protagonist
It’s fine
I don’t miss you
Focus on falling in love
You love with your whole heart
I don’t miss you as a lover
My mistake was when I started
Seeing you as a friend
But my mistake,
We can’t be friends
Because we have a past
And who am I kidding?
No one has a friend they talk to 7 days a week
Besides, it doesn’t really matter
You can’t spell friend without “end”
So, all the castles, soft words,
And more than borderline illegality
Were for nothing
But it’s fine.

It’s been 3 years
Since you left,
I haven’t stopped missing you.

They found you
Swaying in the kitchen
At dawn

I didn’t find out
Until noon
You’d already been gone for 8 hours

You were so happy
The day before.
We had said we would spend
The rest of our lives together.

I don’t know
What went wrong?
I’m sure it was something
I had said
But I’m not sure what.

I’m sorry
For not being there for you
Really I am.
Please believe me.

I am sorry

Written November 6th, 2024

Many cheer with relief
and joy,
while I sit,
and know what is to come.

I think of the warnings given
and ignored,
the deaths
and damage
that will arise.

I think of Romania, 1965.

How the rights of many
were stripped away,
as contraceptives were outlawed,
pregnancies tracked,
and abortions forbidden.

I think of the women who died,
the same-sex lovers
who were made criminals by law,
the children whose lives were ruined
by underfunded and understaffed orphanages.

I think of the people who were lied to
about how the government
would take care of their children
if they couldn’t.

And it started with an election
like this one.

So, I sit,
knowing what is to come,
and think of Romania, 1965.

I wish I could’ve met you
That you could’ve told me stories about your childhood, your family, anything
I wish we could’ve had coffee together, or a breakfast as foreign to me as everyday-bacon
Maybe sausage, Virginia-style! Or Carolina grits, anything!
I got too many missed chances with folks,
I had absolutely no chance of gettin’ to know you
I pray you were enough of a God-fearin’ man, pray Heaven is where you are
Maybe we could meet there, or maybe we were never meant to know of each other
Only God knows.

the light of my eyes pour into the sky through the scope of your hands; dips into a swan trapped in a sea of stars; i hear your fingers screw and unscrew pulling the night closer, closer; my other eye swivels between the tilt of your head and the milky way; i couldn’t make them blink a single tune,

they’ve branded us partners
in crime, killers on the
run. our love is
lethal. kiss like a little death,
a haunting. fuck
like our souls leave the mortal
plane, split it down
the center, split us down
our centers, sew us together–
call us the freak show
all you want;
we like it.

they’ve branded us cannibals,
ravenous animals.
our love is a hunger,
a kiss on the neck vampiric
desire, a modern Bram Stoker.
fuck like a consumption,
i devour you,
you devour me.
no one else holds
the power to tear
apart like you–to drain
the blood from my
chest and lick
the honeyed drops
that trickle
down
the way you do.

they’ve branded us threats,
destruction.
maybe we are.
maybe we’ll tear apart
the fabric of the universe.
maybe we’ll take some
of the scraps and
upholster something new,
something quainter,
something queerer,
thrown together like a quilt,
a patchwork clown suit,
a collage.

we brand each other lovers.

i brand you the sun.

i brand you autumn leaves.

i brand you little beetles.

i brand you a cozy coffee morning.

i brand you my muse.

Safeword: The 1st Amendment
In violation of the social contract

I’ll play the confused Starbucks employee
To your unhinged Karen soccer mom

I’ll be the unemployed new grad
To your Silicon Valley exec

The deeply concerned citizen
To your ICE Agent

The Guantanamo Bay ‘detainee’
To your CIA torturer

The for-profit prisoner
To your indifferent warden

The American
For your country.

meet me at the lake
when the sky burns shades of orange and purple
a warm comfort in the vast unknown

meet me at the lake
when the wind howls sharp and merciless
and the waves rise like wild creatures
breaking their teeth upon the shore

meet me at the lake
when we are children, barefoot and bright-eyed
chasing a horizon we could never touch

meet me at the lake
when our silence spans years not moments
When i’m closer to death than to knowing you
the shape of your hand the tilt of your smile

meet me at the lake
when his daughter has my hazel eyes
and your sons smile belongs to another life

meet me at the lake
when the memories are no longer mine
and i can no longer swim the horizon
you will ask and i will answer

meet me at the lake

It wasn’t your favorite French toast—
breakfast had already slipped away
when we met, almost a month
before you left my hometown.
We didn’t care about anything
aside from the gazes we exchanged.
How much have you missed me?
Tell me in words,
not by brush of your closest finger
against mine. We smiled
when croissants came to us
to fill the gaps
of silence,
of our days
without having
a word.

How was your croissant?

I never spoke of this before
remembering the sounds
which aren’t in either of our native languages.
It’s alright
was your preffered phrase.
You’re alright
so you just took one.
I never cared to take the other again.

How could I eat
even when I was starving?
It was never adobo
and you’re alright.
I do not doubt that you came
from an eight-hour flight
before work and before we met.

How’s your trip in New Zealand?
You told me stories
I had never heard last week
and never had the chance
to ask
but never answered.

You mentioned of many things:
you’ll migrate to Europe,
you missed snowboarding,
you hopped in the bar
with your best friend.
You enjoyed
talking you.

I cut my croissant in half
with this gentle knife.
The butter kissed the halves,
I finished one slowly
while I was chewing flour
to loose its wilderness.

Yet, I am never full.