Tag: original poetry

Black Lodge

Words
toss and turn
in my mind, sleeplessly
trying to realize the truth of what
we were. There is distortion

in the movie
that plays on repeat in my head.
Sometimes the actors change
the script slightly, and
like a game of telephone, the verity is
gone.There may be no truth
remaining in my reality. I
turn and toss
in my bed, hoping to reveal what
we were. Hoping that
the script was based on
a true story, that this was
not a mindless twisted obsession. That
the waves within me which I have
worked so hard to kill were real
in the first place. That
I loved you, once. 

12.31.2012

I’m sitting here trying
not to think of 
you, 
but my mind always lets you 
s
  l
    i
     p 

in through the cracks when it 
    
                                                               wanders. 

Ventriloquist

I let you tear me open
down the middle and climb inside. 
And like a fetus
you settled in
the pit of my stomach; you rearranged my
organs. You twisted my heart. 
And every time I cried, 
I let you take my 
tears and make them yours. 
I let you
scream for me. 
You’d stick 
your hand in my back and 
dress me up in frills, 
carrying me in your 
purse in case someone you knew walked by, 
so you could show them how well
you ventriloquize.  

Fallen Angel

I did not know you,
yet I cry for you
often because I feel as if I do now.
I feel your pain and loneliness.
I, too, see the appeal of the rush
of the cars in the streets
from the 15th story window and
dream of the throbbing bite of the blade
that promises a way out.
I know your burden; I carry it,
too.
I feel you close; I think
of you often.
I cry because
I understand your purpose: to make people see,
to make them feel,
to try to make them understand.
And I’m sorry because you are right.
Sometimes it takes
a fallen angel
to look past our own suffering. 

Five Senses

There are bustling cities
in your kaleidoscope eyes,
and I’ve been waiting for an adventure.
Let me explore them.

There are stories etched
into your porcelain skin,
and I’ve been yearning to get lost in one.
Let me read them.

There are words wedged
between your peanut butter lips
that I’ve been dying to hear you say.
Let me taste them.

The future is flowing
through the lines on your hands,
and I’ve always been superstitious.
Let me feel them.

There are fires burning
in your minefield mind,
and I’ve always loved the heat.
Let me smell the smoke.

Miss Scarlett In The Ballroom With The Lead Pipe

I washed the sheets four times (once
for every year you dreamt beside me)
before your smell
no longer lingered. 

I deleted all of your
voice messages on my phone, but
they still replay 
in my dreams some nights, and
I will always know your texts by heart. 

I put all your clothes I gathered over the years, tangible
bits and pieces of you, into a garbage bag
and donated them, but 
I still wake up on cold mornings wishing I had 
that black jacket of yours. 

I tore apart 
every picture of us, and still 
it took me too long to be able to 
convince myself there was no missing
half in all those photos of just me. 

I have flipped it so many times, and yet
I cannot get the imprint of 
you out of my memory
foam mattress. The outline of your body
etched in chalk on a crime scene.

He’s Over There

She’s sitting in her rocking chair,
her daughter at her feet.
Her hands braid the child’s hair,
who, with her voice so sweet

Asks her mother with a start
to tell the story, please
of the first boy to steal her heart
and make her weak at the knees.

She smiles and looks across the room,
remembering her young and handsome groom,
and points to him sitting in his chair,
“That’s him, my love. That’s him, right there.”