Vision

I carry a package of googly eyes wherever I go
Embellish my way like Hansel and Gretel
"She was here"
In some ways it's nice to know there is someone keeping an eye on you
That isn't the government snooping
That isn't a targeted ad on social media
The eyes remind you that actions have consequences
Even if you haven't been caught, the eyes still have it.

Mama muse

I could never be you- and thus, I revere you.
Mona Lisa smile, the unknowable.
For me, not to be
But you, you are so much more than just one word
More than just the names that you've heard
You have conceived something
That will go on to create
a ripple effect
That beating heart, impossible dream
Love on top of love, brick by brick, to the unseen
Doing more and being more than I could comprehend
Keeping your head, when things are better left unsaid
Your hands that have shaped mountains
Held back rivers
Extinguished fires
Wind on your fingertips outside the car window
What have you seen out there?
What pains have you felt?
How can I help?
I may not have empathy, but I have love.
I know that going it alone is hopeless.
I have a hand, for when yours get too tired.
I will lift you up
I will hold you like we hadn't seen each other in a century
You can't know the ways that I admire your resolve
In a world out to get you
You stand tall and preach love like a gospel
Without ever breaking a sweat
Never forget that you are exactly why people write home
You are someone's home
You are loved
You are so much more than enough.

Heartbreak

The problem with heartbreak
is that after it's over, there is no such thing as technical support
There is no one to call
There is no disaster clean up crew
You're left with pieces of you, shattered-
Scattered across the lower 48 like seed
ground into shards impossible to repair
through traditional methods

The way to mend heartbreak is
nine thousand one hundred and thirty-six  parts alcohol
Three dozen poems strewn across several journals that you will never fill
You can try to fill the void with objects
A new haircut
A new home
A new name
But it will never be the same

The way to heal heartbreak
Is through drowning yourself in work
in other people's words
with other people's hands
The truth of heartbreak is that there is no going back.
It causes permanent irreparable damage
It shows up on every scan, yet there never seems to be a plan
You will never have that optimism to keep you sane
It simply hurts too much hiding behind this pain.

I scrawl down my feelings like they were my last rites
Like my hands can somehow articulate this complicated situation
To reveal some deep down clarity
As if writing is exorcism
and the ink that is my blood takes the place of holy water in this ritual

The problem with heartbreak
is that everything you can think of to mend it is water soluble
Blood, tears, sweat- on and on
Until you wake up in the middle of the night
Your broken heart chugging along.
It used to race, but it's too weak now.

Hands grasp at ghosts while you struggle
Looking at the empty pillow
and wondering if there would ever be a way to jump
into a universe where you were still here
next to me.

To myself, at fourteen...

When I was you, what I knew to be true was not the truth today.

You are lovely, you are strong, and you deserve love- without a need to grovel.

You have seen so much already. Your hands have clawed their way through dirt and loss and heartache- and you have emerged clean on the other side.

You have been touched by people who love you, and by people who just love their hands on you. 

You may feel like you’ll never be clean again.

You may feel like you aren’t whole.

But you are. You are a mountain, a fortress, a goddess. 

People can worship at your feet and never even know the unrelenting beauty inside you.

You have the power within you to heal through your words, your art, your love.

You have the power within you to become something more than what you’ve been told by those who think they know what you’re capable of.

They are just projecting their own insecurities onto you. 

Trust your intuition, believe that you are worth something. You are worth everything.

Specifically, break up with that boyfriend. 

He’s not worth your time and will do you way more harm than good in the long run.

Forgive your parents when they aren’t perfect. They are fallible beings like everyone else. 

Hold them close because they won’t be around forever.

Self-care is so important. Did you know that you are gifted with the use of color? 

Meditate on the color purple. Put on a face mask and take a hot bath. 

Spend more time in nature. 

Sing at the top of your lungs and love what you love unabashedly.

There will be times when it seems like your body is failing you. Nurture it. 

When someone says that you are being dramatic, a hypochondriac, it’s all in your head, know that your intuition about these things has always been correct.

Read. As much as you can, whenever you can.

You are strong, you are wonderful, you are enough. 

Do not worry about me, you’ll see me sooner than you think.

Awake

Paper, words, color, sound, scents, and ritual.
Turning nothing into something magical
I can finally feel myself again
Reaching into the recesses.
Those parts- numbed and lying dormant
Are coming alive again, like the trees outside my window.
Recovering from the longest Winter- two years of my life.
Several homes, several states, several hands,
I look down, and mine no longer feel alien.
I move through the motions that had lost their meaning to me
and they are renewed.
I faltered in trusting myself, let someone else dictate what my life should be
Swallowed the pills and went to sleep.
I'm done sleeping through life
Much better to be an insomniac magician
than to slumber numb.

The tale.

I am a cautionary tale.
The quintessential hard luck story
I often feel like I've been written
Like this is a simulation playing out the various ways
that things can go wrong

I'm nobody's role model, I'm not an inspiration
My intuition is clearly skewed
My body is failing me and I'm out of answers
Every corner, instead of refuge there is dismay

I'm over it all. Pretending to care is so hard
When truly caring means that something will wind up breaking
When the root of all evil is the thing that's keeping you anchored
it's no wonder that things continue to fail.

I am a live wire.
My tongue sparks electric
When my heart is too full to beat
Words catch fire, my hands a conduit
I have become nothing more than a generator.

I create these platitudes, these grand declarations
As a distraction from the truth of the matter
My synapses sparking whenever things become difficult
I can run, this electricity can sustain me for miles

The end is as it began. The story can be a warning
That morphs and becomes something more, a game of telephone.
She was once, and now she's not.
Do not become what you do not understand.

Autonomy

Mars and Venus are at odds again
Making me lose sleep
I never understood what was left to gain
By pretending that you'd made the leap

My words fall short
I am stirring the pot again
Hoping to see it from a different angle
But try as I might, this is the best I've got

My lips form sentences lost on those nearby
Perhaps those whispers were only meant for myself
An affirmation, a declaration of my own solitude
That has taken me this long to recognize.

I go back to space
The sky endless
and my lips finally rest
I look up, and guide myself home

I am finally heard.

The Ruse

If you thought that I didn't see through you
in the moment it took for you to make your way toward me
from the door
Then you are a fool.

I live my life making sense of shadows
Connecting words with meanings unsaid
You think I didn't know what this was?
Darling, I planned it this way.

You feel remorse
I know its name
You feel shame
as if they are the same

You think you might have missed the boat
Lost a chance
Has the gate been closed?
Should you even try?

Words

Words spill out of my hands like water
Nearly faster than I can comprehend
I find myself inside of them
Cloaked by verbosity
I am an allegory
A cautionary tale
Wrapped in complicated prose
Written in morse code
I am the mysterious message at the end of the show
What does it mean?
Who am I today?

Crystalline

fracturing figments

pulling together

forming structure

forming habit

elements combine

color is created

strength unified

personified

held in my hand