Tag: Words

The tree’s red glow

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The lights on the tree
give the room a slight
red hue.

Today feels like any other day,
but something shimmers
around its edges.

I know the right phrases to say
as I thank the pharmacy employee
and nod to the other customers in line.

I hum along to the holiday tunes
but dance home listening to
a silly playlist of mine.

I wish I could fold today and tomorrow
into a little origami crane
to perch on my dresser.

I could choose to unfold it
at any time,
maybe years from now,
and reflect on my first year alone.

Maybe next year will be different,
and I’ll have someone to laugh with
under the red glow of the tree.

Maybe next year will be different,
and I’ll be just as alone,
laughing by myself.

Sincerely,

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Hey,
I know it’s been a while.
How are you?

Me?
I’m okay,
‘okay’ being nearly as
noncommittal of a word
as ‘interesting’.

Why?
Well, it’s been a whirlwind
of days since Saturday.
My brain hasn’t really had time
to turn off.

I’ve been on autopilot,
trying to be as useful as possible —
trying to not make mistakes.

No mistakes?
Well, of course I’ve made them.
I’ve been naive,
my lack of experience showing.

No one has said anything though,
all too tired to either care
or feel the need to point
out my word choice.

Do I know what day it is?
I would have told you Friday,
but I know that’s incorrect.
Maybe Thursday?

It’s Wednesday?
I believe it,
but I hope Thursday
comes soon.

Why?
Well. That’s one day farther.
One day more removed.
One day with more potential.
One day I might actually see you.

Yes. You.
It’s been a while, I know.

The light’s turned on today.
Each bulb glowing like a star.

There was beauty in the quiet,
peace in the unknown.

Now the refrigerator kicks on,
and my light comes from a lamp,
not candle or lantern.

You have to go?
Okay. It was nice to chat.
Perhaps we can do it again.

Have a good one.


and you

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I always loved dreaming,
usually partaking in fantastical,
outrageous situations.

I’ve lived through multiple apocalypses,
assassinations, attacks from tigers and bears, et cetera.
I’ve seen people morph into insects
and household items into reptiles.
I’ve experienced physical pain.

And yet.
These dreams do not
compare to the others —
the ones that feel too realistic
and too present and too possible.

My brain and heart ache
in a way my fantastical dreams
never make me feel.

This is all to say,
I had a dream about you.

It was short and sweet,
most of it lost to whatever place
dreams go.

I met your family,
mom and dad greeting me
with hugs. Your mom and I
talked for a long time.
I really liked them.

And I think they liked me.

I’ve tried to dissect the dream,
and there is one obvious
truth there, laying like
a corpse in a shallow grave.

Maybe it’s simply
a reminder to cradle hope.
Maybe it means
nothing at all.

I could take a guess,
but will I ever really know?

beautiful

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I’m having trouble with words lately.
It feels like everything I write
sounds off — wrong.
I keep thinking it’s great, but then
it’s published and criticized
for things out of my control.

It’s a hard feeling to contest with,
especially when my livelihood revolves
around the words I type on a page.

I know, sometimes it’s my fault.
I type the wrong name or title,
or I confuse subject-verb agreements.

I truly enjoy the work,
but sometimes it feels … empty,
as if my words don’t land on the tarmac
and instead decapitate the tops of trees
to crash in a forest of angry
interpretations and unknown objects.

I read a book recently
were a young female character described poets,
true poets, as people who leave something
beautiful behind.

It’s not poetry, what I write,
but maybe one day I’ll find the beauty
in my stories. One day,
I’ll write with as much passion as
my heart feels, thumping
out of rhythm as my day
rolls away.

I’d like to think I leave something
beautiful here,
but I’m a poor judge
when it comes to these things.

I feel like a child,
a child shroud in a green parka,
a child facing a world too tall
to reach.

My kid hands grasp
at every balloon ribbon floating past
and stray star shining in the sky,
praying to no one
to keep me sane.

stars

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23 stars adorn my body,
23 stars plus one for good luck.

I’m in a new place and feeling alone,
overwhelmed and yet more at peace
than I have in a while.

I’m not trying to block the quiet
with rhythms outside my heart.
I’m not tip-toeing as if scared
of the monster under the bed.

I’m counting on that good luck star
to see me through to next October.
I’m not calling it a promise,
just a hope.
A wish.

guitar static

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I had a dream —
or maybe it was a memory —
that you commented
on one of my poems.

I can’t seem to find it now
or recall which poem it was,
but it made me think
of my horoscope from yesterday,
the one that read,

“your type of paranoia means
that you think someone hates you
if they don’t respond right away.”

Now, I don’t expect you to respond,
but clear thoughts like that
don’t exist in anxiety-riddled bodies.

I’ve learned a few things that
I’ve wanted to share with you —
for no reasons other than
I learned them or
felt insanely ashamed of
not knowing them before —

like realizing Jack White wrote
Steady, as she goes
with Brendan Benson.

Anyways,
I think it was a dream,
a dream where the world spun
and I thought of The Weepies.

I accomplished something great today.
I shared it, of course, hoping you’d care.

I think you did.

But now I’m here,
thinking about the rattling words
in my brain and drinking
a warm beverage
from a shipwrecked mug.

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This is a collection of moments gathered from a recent, mini road-trip.

I.
The windmills look like people
standing stoic on the hillside,
waiting for lovers to come home.

II.
The sky, airbrushed
in oranges and pinks and blues,
reminded me of the beach,
right where the water
swallows the sand.

III.
I imagined standing
in the eye of a hurricane.
Grey wind blowing around me.

IV.
The lights flickered in and out,
as if the city could turn off
with the snap of my fingers.

Being alone

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I wonder how others
spend their time alone.

Do they read,
enchanted by stories
of unknown lands and
beautiful people?

Do they watch films,
enticed by moving shapes
and colors?

Can one say they are alone,
then, when immersed so
thoroughly in another world?

I, well, I’ve tried these
acts of aloneness
to only find companionship.

Thousands of lives I’ve visited.
I’ve drunk with dwarves,
waltzed with princes,
escaped with bandits, and
mourned with lovers.

So, what is it that people
do when fully alone —
alone with no necessary tasks
to complete, no songs
to sing harmony with,
no smiles to return?

I guess it’s only fair
for me to share, for
I felt silly in my games
when this question arose.

I spin around in rolling chairs, kneeling
to see better out the window,
pretending I am a pirate at sea.

I walk in nature,
laughing when I stumble on tree roots,
pausing to turn my body towards the sun.

I write
words and words and words
to make sense of the
conversations in my head —
like I have here.

What do you do when alone?
Is it uncomfortable?

Do you find compassion
in the arms of fictional
characters created to
fill the space around
your soft body?

Do you ache, like I,
sometimes?

Not an autobiography pt. 3

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I am flared jeans
and oversized band shirts.

I found out much about myself,
good and bad and neutral
through listening —
listening to those imposed as teachers
and guardians, but more importantly,
the ones just as hurt as I,
musicians I didn’t know I understood
beyond the sensations they pulled
from my body with each plucked note
and word sung.

Music, perpetually filling the air
with some hymn of life and loss,
saved me as I went from sleep
to wake to sleep, cradled
in the echoing noise.

I am broken records
and burnt corners.

I started writing poetry
to make sense
of the world around me.

What I didn’t understand,
I wrote down, hoping the
pages and pages of inscriptions
would aid in my learning.
Little did I know,
writing was my music —
my saving grace.

I am no weaver
but I feel her curse.

I wish to return to the black river,
to slip from that fallen log
and be baptized by the rushing current,
forgiven.

I would take my great love there,
someday,
to the playground of my younger years,
wanting to share the trails
that my feet ache to remember —
wanting to explain the caves
and bats and other things
that come up as they lean into
the multitudes I contain.

I am bunches of rosemary
and a field of columbine.

I don’t forget easily,
holding on too tight with
a rebel’s fist and a golden heart.
It might be my greatest
character flaw or endearing quality.

This is why seventy percent of my memory
exists as song lyrics melded with reality.
A single song can place me in dozens
of flashbacks, some more welcomed
than others.

I am fossils
and forgotten sunglasses.

Too few letters combine
to tell you the story of everything.
I am held together with glue
and clamps, metal wire and pins.

I wish I could write every memory
onto the sides of a paper lantern,
to set fire to the past
but light the way forward.