I'm at war with the verses lying inside my head,
Should I have been a doctor or plumber instead?
Some other job to be content and productive,
And not chained to this verse, this lyric destructive.

If words can be weapons and a lyric hold power,
Then I grow more dangerous hour by hour.
Slave to the adjective, linked to the verb,
Trapped by each subtle nuance I observe.

A wellspring of discontent, driven by rage,
My life, my heart bleeds out on to the page.
It's not simple grammar but linguistic frustration,
That lends itself perfectly to my situation.

See now my soul spread out on the paper,
A storm of calamity that won't seem to taper.
I am the victim of an invisible crime,
Entrapped by a pattern, a rhythm, a rhyme.

Trying, but failing, I can't even think,
Stuck in this ******* at the whim of the ink.
Now see the other side to the life of a poet,
I am without direction or control and I show it.

Laid upon the sheets, my struggle abounds.
I want quiet right now but I hear deafening sounds!
I cannot get out of this word laden den.
This is my sentence, a life in the pen.

I stand in the middle of the room
My classmates are commanded to listen to me
I am the 14th person to present and so far, everyone has done a good job

I stand in the middle of the room
I begin to saw the name of my project
“My Poem”
I cannot remember what it was about
I do remember, what I felt

I stand in the room,
Hoping that everyone feels what I felt when I was writing it
I felt excited, my stomach had ‘butterflies’ I think
I felt the heat in my heart and the cold on my shoulders.
I felt the tingles all over my body, and the air escaping me

I stood in the middle of the room
I stand in the middle of the room
I was in the middle of the room and said
“My poem”
I heard a chuckle.

I ignored it because the ‘in love’ heart in my chest was more excited than It should have been
I continues and my voice began to play tricks on me
And the r’s rolled and the words were suddenly in another language
My mind still ignored it and continues
Because I felt I could write, and read this and everyone could love it

I stood in the middle of the room,
I waited for the, applause, the smiles, the congrats, or even a simple ‘good job’ like everyone else
Instead…
My teacher said, work on pronunciation. She said it again. Pro-noun-ci-a-tion
Ok. ‘Work on grammar.’ ‘Work on sentence structure’
“Work on being American” the chuckle said
Or the person who chuckled?

It didn’t mean much, you know
I loved writing so much that it did not matter
I would be a writer, I would continue to
STAND in the middle of the room and share my talent
And when I did, he chuckled
She chuckled, I was Mexican

Not a writer. Writers can’t be Mexican
Unless you write in Spanish and in Mexico
But I was too American for that at this point…

SO the next time I wrote I was ashamed,
Maybe if someone else wrote my writing?
But it didn’t matter,
When the teacher began reading,
The chuckle reminded the class it was the ‘Mexican’ who wrote it

“Mi nina” My mom would say
She reminded me that no only was I Mexican
I was a woman,
Only men thrive in this world
I believed it
And that is why my name is ‘The Voice’
Not my actually name,
Disclosure: I accept criticism on how to better my writing
NOT on what to write or on my background

This heart inside of me
Has been living out on the streets
No need to ask how long
It just needs a home

Try as hard as it might
It's so tired of the daily grind
Wandering to and fro
In desperate search of a home

It's been out on the road for years
Making its intentions clear
How much further must this heart roam
Out there looking for a home

Not looking for sympathy
But looking to fills its needs
That's really all this heart wants
In its search for a home

No matter how far it seems
It's ready to take the leap
Knowing it can't do this alone
Ready for a home

Starry nights
Endless
an unfathomable depth to the skies
Yet the stars,
They feel so close
Like fairy dust
Twinkling
And i feel like
I feel like i could touch them
Reach
Reach
Dip my fingers in their glow
Swirl them in the galaxies
Stir the milky way
And you,
Lying next to me
on the cold,
hard asphalt,
Smile.
Come dip your fingertips
in the night’s wonder
With me.
Come,
Let your mind wander
With me.
Put your free hand
In mine
And we’ll swim through
Galaxies.
Come,
Dream with me.