Author: poetryfest

She is not me.
I am not her.

Yet you cling to her memory,
the artifacts she left without knowing how soon she’d be gone,
and you force me to gaze upon them.
You believe showing me proof of her existence will inspire me to be like her.
You think I’ll admire her and the things she left behind.
You tell me that is who I’m supposed to be,

and I don’t understand it.
I’m actually content with the person I’ve become.
I don’t get why you want me to be someone else.
You pray my indifference will give way to ambition,
and completely fail to notice:

I can’t be molded to your vision.
I’m living for myself and the ones I love, not you.
I don’t give a shit who you want me to be.

I am not her.
She is not me.

You’re the kind of love
that’s always there,
the kind of comfort that never asks questions.
If you have them, I never know.
Whether you’re in my arms,
in my hands,
whether you’re in the corner or
on top of the cover.

I reach for you,
trusting my first mind
more often than the second.
You’re always there,
the last place that I left you,
but the first place I think to look.
Your button-like eyes
searching me.

I don’t know what quite to call you.
You’re not loud,
but you’re also not quiet.
I sometimes wonder if you go to sleep,
choosing to stay up with me all times of the night
regardless if it’s the same story
you’ve heard a million times,
or if some of the things I say
require more patience.

You never take a deep breath.
Those button-like eyes stare at me
as lovingly as they did the day
you were introduced to my life.
You’ve changed my perspective
on a lot of things
how deeply I can hold on to things,
sometimes even fold.

And you do it all by being yourself.
By being real.
You don’t pretend to save me.
You don’t tell me things

just to shut me up.
In a world where we’re taught
to put away childish things,
I am glad that I didn’t listen.
I am glad that you never left.

It was one tuesday long ago.
The birds were squealing.
And the oceans were shallow.
As the sun stopped revealing.
My dog said hi, and I fainted right there.
My mother said I was insane.
But I didn’t care.
So she took me to therapy that day.
The doctor was a moose, and he spoke to a llama.
They spoke of the news, and sang the drama.
Mrs Hippo was a singer and fell down the stairs.
So they buried her in the backyard.
And she blew up the secret lair.
And so her soul and the llama sparred.
Then the moose looked me in the eyes.
You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.
You may be a mind reader in disguise.
My actual name is llama Moose.

We were so close in that bed
I couldn’t help but breathe you in.
I hovered my hands over your skin
moving from hot to cold,
chasing the goosebumps from
one end of you to the other.

You held me like you meant it
and that was all the permission
I needed that night.

You don’t even make sense sometimes.
You stutter, you flutter,
all over me, tripping over
steps and phrases.

I like how the words taste in my mouth
when I answer your
stupid, vapid questions.
You weirdo.
My favorite 2AM.
Come here.
Breathe me in.
Finish the perfume on my neck.
I sprayed a little bit more when
you weren’t looking.

I think noones gonna forget
that first kiss.
A fire extinguisher
between us could not stop
the tension and attraction.
It was intimate
and almost immediate.
Like we were meant to do it
all along.

That sofa will forever hold you.
Like how you held my head and my hand
while you kissed the fucking moles out of my lips.
It will always stay with me,
how you gave me that incredible weight
of loving and leaving at the same damn time.

Hope is the thing with feathers,
shot down in my Daddy’s yard.
Blur of Red on White, a dove
fallen from frostbit window. It is a
gray overcast Morning, the day
after the funeral. From a carriage
Death lifts off his Sunglasses to
watch the Bird fall. We are in my
room and I am writing a Poem of
a Poem, so it’s not really a Poem
at all. Sue, do you hear it, too?
The call of bird song, early into
the Mourning. It is Golden-wrought,
A Muse. In the dark to me it whispers,
“Psst. Dickinson, you’ve really got to
stop isolating yourself in here. You
have no Friends, and it is Sad. Please
see a Doctor. Also, become Famous.”
My Muse sucks. But I keep writing
and I keep writing. The bird is buried
next to me and when I die. Remember
my Feathers go to You, Sue. And also
make sure to Close your Windows. Birds
seriously like to hit them Blind.

Once, or maybe twice
When I remembered how
You started fire
Howling in that midnight way
We read about in books
And calm within the kindness
Pressed and turned to roll
In recompense
The clemency sought out
Would never burn you from within
But lie awake and wonder
Once, or maybe twice
When I remembered how
Your hands caressed
The long and the invisible
While reaching out for God
Or something close enough
To break your heart and leave
You weeping out from joy
In heated beds of doubt beguiled
All misplaced, regained, removed
And locked up safely somewhere
Once, or maybe twice

Always irate
Never chaste
Laying waste
Like, cut and paste
Ever-present
Incandescent
Incessant depressant
Acting prepubescent.
Sour
Acidic
Trauer
Bromidic
Bitter
Bullshitter
Yeah, I hit her.
Created a stir.
Not really a blur.
I concur,
Your mind is as solid as vapeur.
I’m trying to with it, but I just might spit it.
You’re potent, my Sweet Lemonade.
Now I’m sure the pulp of my chest will mature.
My wrath, I will choose to detour.
Though I’m secure, I’ll fight with fervor.
You better cry for an ally.
My Sweet Lemonade.

You were always such a pig, all that was missing was the apple between your teeth.
You know I secretly loved it, even with the denial on my lips.
The laughter twinged with truth; we were the only ones in the loop.
I named you Piggy and you didn’t mind; you didn’t even try to change my mind.
Your protest, call me whatever you like “as long as you don’t call me late for dinner.”
Dinner, our favorite thing to do, you chopping vegetables and me criticizing everything.
I love who you are at the end of the night.
I let you hug me with all your might.
You love me the way that God loves the church and that’s alright.
I named you Piggy and you didn’t mind.
I love that because you were mine.

What happened to you?
What happened to the girl who’s curiosity was its guide
Who explored the new ideas of the tide
Who was so unafraid to be who she was
No matter who thought or looked
No matter who judged or dared
To tell her that what she was feeling wasn’t fair
What happened to the girl that stood by her ideals
While recognizing how the world was hurting the people she loved
Who fought for love, who saw that God did the same
Who empathized with the worst
Who prayed for better times
For immediate change instead of immediate sorrow

A youthful girl of music and whimsy
Met with mixed feelings making her dizzy
The embers of the world’s end around her
Jumping into the flames like she’s asked to
Not questioning the burns on her body
As her skin melts away to oily gasoline
That contributes to the fire birthed in empty promises
You’d never ask why the flames were there in the first place nor why you were told to jump into them
The notion of questions a danger
Yet perhaps you do not see
The notions of obedience a heavier danger
A larger weight breaking away the muscles of your heart
Each vein and artery bursting into a bloody river
That drowns you, stealing your breath and your voice

No more melodies to sing
No more harmonies to attempt
Nothing left but sheet music crumpled up and thrown away
You think the fire will bring you warmth and will warm the skies until the rain comes and cools
it all
The rain is not coming
The fire is boiling hot
And as it spreads throughout the forest
It burns us all

I’m disappointed and upset and angry
Angry because I know this is not you
Upset because you cannot oppose it
And disappointed that you’d even think that way at all
I know you won’t vote.
I know you can’t escape
I know you think there’s no point to oppose
What happened to the girl
With music in her heart
And curiosity as her guide?

The girl who asked me to swim
Because she was curious
The girl who asked me about my identity
Because she was curious
The girl who asked me about my struggles
Because she was curious

That girl is dead
Buried away in a grave her own family and system put her into
Suffocating her alive and breathing it thick dirt and moss
Until her lungs did not know what true oxygen was
Only inhaling the fake breath that their new fostered child would breathe

Perhaps deep down
I believe I did not do enough
And feel that, although I did not grab a shovel
I did not bury you away
I still see your blood on my hands
Each and every day.

What happened to you is a simple question to answer, but complex in nature
What happened to you is that you died
And reborn into a cacti to pointy to the touch and uncertain of what would be said
Rather than the flowers that cacti grew
You were reborn into spikes
Prickly and sharp
Yet, deep down, that girl that was a flower is somewhere in there

I know that right now, and possibly never, that flower will never see the light of day.
And when it wilts, what then?
What happened to you?
What will happen to you?

You keep me,
as if I were a monk
inside the monastery of your heart.

You keep me,
as the deepest secret dwelling
in the darkest part of your heart.

You keep me,
as the quickest sentiment sent and meant
to strike passion in your heart.

You keep me,
replaying inside your brain
like the melodic memories
of the best musician of every genre
playing the chords of your heart.

You keep me,
on your fingertips
like a gust of wind
blowing from a second-floor window.

And now that I am gone,
you must release me,
as life has released me inside your heart.