I looked in the mirror this morning,
And there was a little tiny change,
An older look to my eyes,
My smile was foreign and strange.

My posture was straighter and taller,
My cheeks were thinner and slim.
I'm changing right before my eyes,
And every day I'm at the whim
of Whoever decides what I'll be
When I'm an adult someday.
When make believe no longer appeals to me,
And I've forgotten how to play.

So what I want to say to this elusive Whoever,
what I want to ask of this woman,
Is "Are all these changes the real me?
And is the real me who I am?"

It took sixteen years to become acquainted with my old self.

The self that:

Could not write on crumpled papers,
Or sleep in untucked sheets,
Played her scales robotically,
Left no word incomplete.
Labelled all the cupboards,
Books were organized by name,
This was the life I led.
I never knew that it would change.

it took 4 weeks to fall in love with my new self

the
self
tha
t

writes on ollld receipts,
   kicks the covers        off the bed
     ~lets my fingers play freely~
         not every sentence has an en-
            stores shoes with coffee mugs!!
               writes in mArGiNs to save time
                  not all rules need to be   f o l l o w e d
                    not all poems need to

                        sound the same

who knew that little pill
would teach me how to live
not erase the 'me' that showed
but bring out the 'me' that hid
16 years of worry
of obsessive, anxious thoughts
who knew that little pill
would change me
I,
for one,
did not
.

- p. winter

I do not have the
attention span for reading
haikus, so i wont

The timeless evening
with stars drooping down to see
you and your dignified strangeness
Life was blind, life was kind

You burnt my time, made it disappear
Recall how you looked, what silvery words you used
Enigmatic, glowing soul

her foot never fully touched the ground,
remaining half afloat in the air--
stuck in the clouded mist of her anxious mind,
she could not grasp the full weight of reality

her dance too tentative to be considered one of grace,
she treaded carefully with each step, although,
she knew this all with a great familiarity--

a constant state of limbo and disarray,
out of touch with sight and mind,
thoughtless rumination
all gather to combine into this displacement

she leaps with hope and faith,
but unable to press her foot along the earth
she glides over the dust and ruin,
seeking to avoid rather than settle-- she survives without living

i tried.
i tried to be everything for you.
tried to be that "special" girl. i listened. i cared. gave advice when i felt it was needed. i tried to give you all of me.
but you wanted no parts.
i fell in love with you. or at least..the potential i saw in you.
you see, i had this crazy thought in my head.
that maybe, just maybe, you loved me as much as i loved you.
that you cared. just enough. or maybe just a little more.
you were my world, but i was never yours.
i vowed to never give so much of myself to one single person.
but something about you changed that.
you see, i saw something in you.
apparently something no one else saw. and against my better judgment, i let you **** me in.
into this godforsaken headspace. that i can't seem to get out of.
and i swear I'm trying, but at times i grow tired of fighting.
the words you spoke left me crestfallen.
and the very words that once tasted like the sweetest of nectar, are now poisonous venom forever embedded in my heart and mind.
my heart, which was once strong, lively, and upbeat, has now become fragile, shriveled, and somber.
all from the one person i held closest.
but you can never say i didn't try.
i tried my hardest. but you wanted no parts.
and now I'm left here on the floor. a fragment of my former self. scrambling trying to find the answers on try to become whole again.
and yet still...you still want no parts.