I Fear the Ink’s Immortality

I’m out to dinner
with my father
talking about how I can talk to some guys
and he asks:
“Do you ever talk to them
about your poetry?”
And I shake my head like the answer is obvious,
laugh at the image of them caring before stating:
“Never.”

Because how do you explain
to someone that
when they smile in your direction
Vesuvius is erupting
and you are covered in lava?
That the way they breathe
is a lullaby
and when they pull away
you ache for the gentlest of touches
and though
neither of you are breathing heavy
you kiss their nose,
their forehead,
make sure
their pulse
is not tripping over itself
in order to form
your name in Morse Code beats.

How do you look someone in the eye
and say I hear your footsteps
like rain on a tin roof
and close my eyes;
fall into daydreams
when you come closer,
picture you holding me
tangled up in sheets
with rivers racing down the panes
of our future home?

How do I explain
that my heart
and all the shrapnel embedded in
its four chambers
are lying in wait
in your open palms
and though I never thought you were
one for cannibalism
I’m waiting for you to take a bite
and eat up my love?

How do I look across a table
at brown or blue
eyes and tell them
I’m drowning,
don’t send help,
don’t throw
life preserver
but do dive in?
Join me in this ocean
with my flushed cheeks
and your tide-like pull,
I am sinking
and wanting to spill all over you.

I date boys
who gets degrees in science
or who waste time
in high environments
and consider this
what I deserve.

I fear loving a writer
because who’s to say
I’ll turn against the light
and he won’t write about the curve
of my profile against a candle,
envying the very wax that drips
from the wick.

I wouldn’t know what to do with this.

Let alone how to talk about it.

So I keep my mouth shut,
smile coyly,
snarl sarcastic,
and laugh loudly
to fill the pit
that sits in my stomach
waiting for someone to find
beauty in the letters
that spill of my tongue
rather than the lips
that conceal it.

Crows, Hills, and Houses

*in the style of “Heaven, Hell, and Holding Places”*

 

We are driving 

on some random road that weaves
from Pennsylvania to Delaware
until we are on our way home.

And I’m staring

up some abandoned hill
with the outlines of a 
foundation
with wooden beams
kept company
by crows.

And like birds on a line,
they stare down at passersby,
and I wonder why,
someone left 
this skeleton of a shelter
abandoned;
that their future is now
“for the birds”

and yes, that line is a 
play on words,
of course.

Because we never think of those
without homes.
Those who take the road
with burdens on their back
but hearts with wings
and dreams out of reach perched on some
split wire,
skeleton of a spark.

Tell me now,
what do we do about these people in the dark?

Tell me if the love we are looking for
will ever find its
intended mark:
our (your/my) heart.

Tell me if love
can be found in a place
where care was once put into
but never finished;

If traces of a home
can stand 
on love alone?

Tell me 

about the 
homeless
and the hopeless
and if they are truly
one and the same;

if that murder of crows
knows something we don’t,

if that hill is only abandoned 
because we refused to climb it,

if our hearts are hollow
because we are afraid of having
something
someone else
inhabit them.

And we roll on by,

headed back to Jersey
to the safety of a brick building,
covered in panelling,
telling ourselves
we find homes in other things,
other people,
and call it by the name of
“family”.
Say “love”
is just another term
for “security”.

And I realize the foundation was 
never really abandoned,
because though the owners had left,
that murder,
that family,
those crows still
kept the skeleton up on the hill
company.

“Home” is wherever we aren’t lonely. 

I’ve Got Love to Spare

And if I’ve never wrote a poem
for 
or 
about 
you
I must’ve never
loved you to begin with.

And trust me,
that is your misfortune. 

And Holy Crap, I’m Proud of This

I can’t decide
if I’ve been writing love poems
or anthems for the last
year or so.

And when Pablo was whispering of
my skin like summer
and when William said my lips were like pilgrims
begging to be purged of sin,
I never heard their words in
your voice.

Ed is singing
and I am vibrating
with tears,
with frustration,
anger,
and a little bit of giving up.

Because I can crave lips on my neck,
I can crave your fingers digging into my hips,
my legs on either side,
our hips toasting one another,
and we were never
we may never be

close

enough.

Does not make me any less pure.
Does not make me any less of the girl
I was hours before.
Garden locked;
well-wishing.

Pennies dropped,
over and over.
And I am an anthem author,
I am poem of masochism.

I am bloody mess after murder.
I am heart broker.

I am collector
of tear jars,
firefly eyes,
and steady blood flow.

And I want to smear my love
over you like language:
swallow you in simile,
melt into you like metaphor,
be the alliterated aroma therapy
on your skin,
and simultaneously
you are etching our names
into the backs of our hands,

your scar is my favorite.
You’ve branded my name in
and I am
synonym for love.

And you are synonym for hope.
And I don’t know
if I’ve been writing love poems
or anthems for the last couples of months or so.

But I know
roses are red
and I’ll pledge my allegiance
to you.

Babe: {Patience}

I’m realizing with you,

I won’t have to try so hard.

That it is possible that somebody will take

my hand, for once.

That they will make time,

and come to me.

It’s no secret that I’m waiting on several things,

so why can’t I wait on you?

Why do I keep putting others in your place?

I am certain you will not belittle me,

and I’m 100% positive you will do your best to respect me,

but do remember to correct me when I’m out of line.

I guess what I’m waiting on most is to be cared for,

for the first time in forever.

To be taken care of,

and made little in the sense that

you will shield me from the cruel outside,

but won’t stop me from experiencing the world.

I’m not asking for presents,

I hope I never have to.

I believe we are both coming into this with expectations,

and me trying to make them into you,

just isn’t happening.

I’m settling.

Talk about downgrading.

I’m sorry that I’ve been trying to play games,

when you and I both know a tease is something inbred and not made.

And I can’t sit here and coyly smile

or flip my hair and pretend I cause their hearts to jump.

We both know

if their hearts are racing,

if their eyes are widening,

I ain’t the one for that.

And I’m okay with that.

Because love, wherever you are?

I’m down for that.

As hard as it is,

I’m waiting on that.

On you.

And all the

late night drives,

pretty sights, and

neon lights that come after that.

The Next Time He Asks Me About Bands

Let me start this off by saying I’m slightly distracted when the boy smiles.

Let me warn my future self I’m probably in for some type of heartache.

Let me remind my future self, he said I’d be bored of him “after two weeks”

But the next time he asks me about what music I like,

I won’t only say KPop.

The next time he asks me,

if there is a next time,

then this is what I’ll say:

PTX and therefore various other types of accapella.

My heart soars with songs like “Bohemian Rhapsody”,

“Carry On My Wayward Son”, and “Come Sail Away”.

It’s predictable and all too cliche.

And though I despise them,

I am a living and breathing one in and of myself.

The next time he asks me about bands

I’ll tell him:

Backstreet Boys

N’Sync

One Direction

Teen Top

SuperJunior.

I have infatuation with boy bands,

and sappy, catchy, yet poorly written rifts.

Don’t get me started on bridges.

The next time he asks me who my top three are:

I’ll tell him Ellie Goulding,

Florence + The Machine

and Ed Sheeran

Because they told me it was okay to struggle

in the relationship.

They told me that love can be destructive,

mighty,

and beautiful in its devastation.

That in the wreck,

that in twisted scraps left over in your heart from when it collapsed in on itself,

from that time when you refused to let it function with a now bare,

a now spare room,

there are antiques to be admired,

and hope that has managed to survive in the rubble.

The next time he names bands that I don’t know,

I will beg him for mixed CDs,

I will acquaint myself with their melodic poetry.

I will learn their words,

their names,

until they are like fingerprints ingrained in my memory;

until they are are pass codes to unlock worlds,

visions,

and emotions that I didn’t know could stir within me.

The next time he stares at me quizzically,

I will gush about my love for all things 80s:

Queen

Billy Joel

ELO

The Cars

Journey

Michael Jackson

and even the one-hit wonders,

because how can he know me without knowing about “Come on, Eileen.”

If he is still standing by me at this point,
I will have no choice but to hug him.

The next time he asks me what’s most recently added to my iPod,

I will have to tell him New Politics

Arctic Monkeys,

MIA,

and Miley.

I am sorry that I lack originality.

I will have to explain that I have a fascination with middle school R&B:

Chris Brown,

Usher,

Ray J,

New Boyz.

But have no idea how to rap,

or what rap I know besides the three verses that are in

“Super Bass”,

“Starships”,

and the scarce lines from “Pound the Alarm”;

all Nicki.

Will he know that I was rocked to sleep by Motown

and woken up by rock anthems in the course of driving between

Florida and the border of South Carolina?

That when I awoke to Twisted Sister, half the time I was singing along.

Classic rock comes on the radio,

and somehow,

I can manage to make out the chorus?
And though I don’t know ACDC well enough,

“Get Loose/ From the Noose”

Is a line worthy of blasting.

When I reveal that I jam hardcore to

“In the Closet”,

and sing like a one-man choir when it comes to

“Man in the Mirror” and

“Will You Be There?”

will his fascination with me finally fade?

Will he want to know about the CDs I have accumulated in the past five months:

Michael Buble,

Ariana Grande,

Katy Perry,

One Direction,

Bastille,

and now: Miley.

I’m debating if I want AM

or Lana del Rey?

I want to listen to Cage the Elephant

and know all the words to “Loser”,

I have never been keen on Nirvana,

but I can sing the classics

(at least the lines I make out).

He says I don’t know him well enough to write poetry.

But the real question is:

will I get the chance to,

after he figures out these musical revelations,

the harmonious reflections

that make up just a quarter of my

intricate,

and dazzling complexity?

Babe: {Terror}

I want you to scare me.

I want to fear the fact that you are willingly to fall for me.

That you will charge forth willingly and blindly,

and wait in the silence, in the darkness,

for my fingers to entwine with yours.

Perform open heart surgery.

See inside of me what others shrunk back at,

the internal workings of my complexity.

Maybe it’s slightly interesting?

The range of my music taste from Dani California, to Fat Bottomed Girls, to Give Me Love, to Clap Your Hands < 2NE1’s song.

The light in your eyes will come from

whatever sparks your curiosity.

I only pray you’ll be able to take my fragility.

And break it:

Break in my spontaneity, 

my willingness to try you out.

To try the inner working of whatever might be if we become a “we”.

Eventually.  

Will you make me believe in the physical attribute of beauty again?
It’s so easy to look at flowers and oceans and skies

sunsets and sunrise

but never my own reflection.

Sure,

I know I’m pretty enough.

But is that worthy of over-used words such as 
“Beautiful”?

Yes; they cheapened it for me.

Will you beg to know my secrets, my fears and dreams,

regrets, and failures,

just because you claim they are pieces of me,

pieces that you want to keep?
Pieces that you’ll hide in your heart like scripture, like a lock of hair,

if only so that when the time comes for me to flee,

you won’t only be left with memory,

but with tangibility?

(I should’ve considered that with him.)

When I meet you,

will it strike me then,

like lightning?

That the tides have changed,

the time has come,

and now I will have to start all over again;

this time with one who wants to dive in,

(so he says)

with one who fears only my rejection,

because he wants to love my flaws,

fearlessly.

Redemption

Seeking attention

from the boy who knows very little about me.

Knowing your vices,

but agreeing to disagree;

boy, if he knew,

he would not be happy with me.

Through you,

I wanted to thread happiness,

like a product freshly knit,

the holes allowing in a little bit of wind,

but still we wear it for fashion.

Small, needle-made flaws,

yet,

there is beauty within.

If I splayed my fingers across your chest,

would your heartbeat ripple,

or would it sputter:

unamused breath.

Would you grasp my wrists and pull me from your frame,

thinking obscenities rather than speaking a name

which in itself asks for Another’s strength…

I

am broken and bruised

woman

I

have made myself

my own victim

Realizing

I relied

too much on your validation

as an indication

of my person-

al worth,

beauty,

love.

I

am ashamed of my own

degradation,

the names he is calling me

are the ones we allowed to shape a nation,

of women who have fallen at the hands of men

from whom they once wanted fingertips to leave

indentation

on the paper that was their skin;

a book marked by fingerprinted stains,

scratches and rash actions

both thick and thin.

He bites your lip,

you let him in.

He stares into your eyes,

you let him win.

All because you thought,

he listened

He’s different

Indifferent,

to your love.

To your escape, rather

to the madhouse that has become your brain;

No matter,

fun adventures never happen to the sane,

you figure.

Still,

this does not make you less bitter.

You hope to wipe the smile,

the satisfaction off his face.

Lips you longed to taste,

with hands squeezing your waist

into nothing

no one,

until he took your soul right out of its frame,

to sign it with his name,

like an autographed memory,

in permanent Sharpie,

you can’t erase.

Though he walks away:

completely unscathed.

You wanted to feel happy again;

for whose sake?

He made you smile without realizing:

you’re blushing

in the wake of another

lover who’s moved on without you.

In a friend/brother who could live without you.

Trying to rely on another,

who could only doubt you.

Trying to look this adorable boy in the eye,

without question;

were you crushing on him,

or were you searching for redemption?

Sleeping Pulse

I wonder if my heart races in my sleep,
Every time that I see you appear in my dreams.

Stains

She writes so she doesn’t have to scream obscenities every time

the memories come crashing back into her.

She fights off the nausea of your presence,

with words never spoken aloud,

that fight the battle of missing you and hating you

that runs rampant in her mind.

But though she may stumble away from the war, battered and bruised
She’ll remain untainted.
And that is its own quiet victory:
Not letting emotion corrupt her integrity.