you kicked gravel,
uprooted earth in my mouth.
growing on my tongue,
developing consciousness

yet i swallow my city,
stick out my tongue to the earth,
and taste your cruelty so strongly

i’m not her.
she may be me,
but i am not her.

i couldn’t have been,
the one so desperately foolish,
yet brazenly confident,
in the act of ruining my foundation.

she did tear up the floorboards,
and she blazed the wood to ash,
silent before the flame.

and me,
left with soot in my palms,
have to yet again explain.

she is not me,
but i cannot escape being her.

turning a blind eye,
“protecting my peace”
i never could do it quite correctly.

the ill feelings of comparison,
curiosity & resentment most women harbor,
keep me in line

yet i know when i fall,
inevitably it seems,
my eyes will open wide to the sky.

my “peace” will not be there to catch me.

i hope you stand in its place,
arms outstretched,
below the skyline.

i cannot birth the sadness from my body,
as many women do,
and disregard its existence entirety

it exists as me,
feeding from within,

my desire to free it,
the will to move past,
does nothing.

having no escape from myself,
i must harbor the baby of my own wretchedness,
forever nursing a violent sickness

tranquility in the dark,
head full of sand,
i know better.

unease,
a trashing sea,
breaks to the forefront.


keep vigilant,
in the serenity,
in the times all seems right.

it’s only a matter of time,
before the waves meet the sand,
and all returns to chaos once more,
current pulling back.

bluebirds sing.

seeing the world,
smell the smells and hear the sounds,
bluebirds sing amongst themselves.

the cold metal bars caked in rust,
door tightly shut,
they rest upon a birch woven over metal.

sat so still,
watching people pass,
the bluebirds sing.

if you get close to hear,
open the metal door,
free the bluebird from the cage.

it will remain among its peers,
positioned on the pirch,
with the door wide open.

bluebirds sing.

i watch.

i watch as the decisions are made,
the lifestyle picked.
so much time left yet so little life to live.

at the first fall from grace,
what was to come was already set.

behind a white picket fence filled with cracks,
while hiding in the overgrown grass i’ll watch.

just as i had watched then,
thinking the decisions were mine,
just as i watch now,
thinking it’s too late,
just as i always have,
watched. watching.