She blooms like a rose
Being choked by noxious weeds.
She will survive this

Once mighty green leaves,
Now swaying here and there
They are changing colours
From green –
To red to indigo,
And then to yellow, finally.
Ready to fall down,
To float away freely,
Over the blue sky
Far far away
From the tree

I used to be
Bright and breezy-
Like a green leaf,
Always sticking to the tree.
Now I feel-
That I am ;
Changing too
Ready to fall,
Breaking free
To float freely
…. Away from the tree..

i’m so sorry for being such a mess
for not having the right words
or any words at all
but i’m trying
i really am
trying

*(s.m)

a sweet girl falls for the first boy she sees
and he is sweet for a while

his curly hair, devilish stare keeps her afflicted for a bit
speaking in tongues, translating words into kisses when they had none
‘i want to kiss you over and over’ in a jazz bar where the drummer isn’t very good
taking the wrong bus three times in a row

he claims he hates poetry and thats all she ever does, write about him
“i can’t wait to remember you”
zippers and untied shoes
a train ride north to sleep at his parents house
and they usually stumble in together after a pint or two
sneaking up the stairs, a bathroom with no doorknob
the floors sing beneath them

Can I be forgiven for my impulsive need
to present my love to you
as a viking would after a day hard at work

I’m physical about it
and chaos theory is the dress
I choose to wear to ****** you
not those flimsy night-sky black things
or a cliché of words tucked up behind your ear


I'm dressed up in an imaginary beard
with a palm full of unpredictability
that makes you buckle
underneath forgotten desires
and we destroy ourselves this way for hours
only to wake up and repeat.

I absorb you alpha and you become invisible
like a woman over 50
I'm a force to be frightened of
and you are an empty shell.


Never love someone
who isn’t stronger than your darkness.
You will **** them every time
and spend the rest of your days
explaining the head on a stick
at the end of your bed
to your next lover
it can become tiresome.


But you never asked questions.
You accepted my grit
my madness
and lust for emotional bloodshed
so i kept going.


You just waited patiently
to see if the sword in my hand
would fall away in the face of your delicate beauty
unnatural for a man admittedly
more suited for a goddess
speaking ancient Greek from magic lips.

You could have spoken
incoherent babble for all i cared
as i marvelled at your fingers
just trophies on hands not from this world.


Again, I’m physical about it
and i saw myself arrange quickly
your internal magnificence
to match the outer shell, so perfect
whether real or imagined
I indulged my vanity
that you were mine
washed with your sunshine
every time we moved
into each other’s view.

Addiction to beauty
it’s akin to a serial art buyer
I’d bid my blood to have that prize
next to me each night
and that’s all you were to me
it must have seemed.


Your love was more than mine i thought
so i could afford to be careless
I was a swashbuckling hero to myself
because i never believed you knew how to be
so just lie there and look the part
and be there when I come home
from severing heads of out-dated ideas
about how to move through life.


Quietly though, you were writing secret sonnets to yourself
about the possibility of our “maybe” love
I rode right over that
like a warlord blinded by personal victories
making my way to a new precipice
another conquest
forgetting with eyes wide open
how to encase another in perfect intimacy.


You just waited patiently
to  see if the sword in my hand would fall
until one night, alone again
you saw the space at the end of the bed
where your own head would stand
and you ran into the night
dancing over misplaced dreams
now scattered all around like forgotten tombstones
as I returned home to my future of regret.


Now this weighty silence between us
has me filling the empty space with love songs
to myself
just to hear us again.

By Emily Riddle-Age 9  

Special: The dictionary describes an angel as a "thing or person, that means a lot to someone. Well, I describe an angel as my grandmother.

My grandmother is a wonderful person, and what she is best at
is caring about what I will become.
I am so glad to be in her life, and in her beautiful world.

She has a heart of gold, and is a "doctor to my soul."
She is the "nurse" that make my hurts disappear.
She is my "piggy bank of niceness."

When I would get a birthday, or Christmas gift, she would always say,
"If you don't like it, be sure to try it."
I would always listen to her, for everybody knows
"grandmothers are always right."

I think of her everyday, and feel that  I can do anything
when I'm around her. Just remember,
"Always be happy for what you have, and don't imagine a life without a grandmother."

They are worth a billion dollars.

copyright: emily riddle August 27,2014

Penned in 2013 by my granddaughter, Emily Riddle. Written for her Grandmother Linda, its worth more than a billion dollars.