allison joy: Favorites

Feb 2014 allison joy

untitled

Feb 2014 allison joy

Raymond Johnson

untitled

I have fallen in love with the lilac trees
oh how i long to be the gentle wind
that blows slowly through their leaves

i could speak ceaselessly for a thousand years
and still not explain why
your magnificence brings me to tears

i looked upon your sunkissed face
and for a moment
the vicissitudes of the fates
seemed a little less vicious
the winds a little less harsh
and the world a little less cruel.

heaven is a real place,
and it is a few inches of skin
just below your nose.

i am a man of many words and metaphors
but none of them can accurately describe
the simple beauty of the fact
that you are mine
and i am yours.

i wish to give you the world two times over
and three more times just because.

i was so lost amongst the wilds
and yet you still found me.

the pair of hands i've never held
are the ones i am dying to hold.

Feb 2014 allison joy

this is not a love poem

Feb 2014 allison joy

Raymond Johnson

this is not a love poem

I am not your Romeo
and you are not my ******* Juliet
and yet
we are still kept apart
by miles and years
and no amount of wasted tears will ever
change the fact that
I am not your Romeo
and you are not my ******* Juliet.
This is not a fairytale,
there is no happy ending
and I am sick and tired of sending
prayers up to a god
that doesn't care
or doesn't even exist.
I am not your Romeo
and you are not my ******* Juliet.
this is the
seventh
time that fate has felt like
dangling a beautiful soul
in front of my face yet out of my grasp
(I keep count because I'm a bit of a *******)
and I'm not sure how much longer I want to keep playing this game.
but don't
worry your pretty little head baby I'll
be around until you're done with me.
I'll be yours until you decide to
move on and become just another number on my list
and sweet memories I wish I could forget because
I am not your Romeo
and you are not my ******* Juliet.

Jan 2014 allison joy

THIS WAS TITLED WITH YOUR NAME

Jan 2014 allison joy

blankpoems

THIS WAS TITLED WITH YOUR NAME

my throat is a forest fire,
a burning map that never leads to
'the depths of virginia'

your hands are made of water,
icy cold and haunting and
I don't know what else to say except
"please"

I sometimes think that we should have a history book
rewritten with our names, because I'll be ******* if
we are not rewarded for the way we forget about our past

I WONDER IF WHAT WE TALK ABOUT AFTER MIDNIGHT
HAS ANY IMPACT ON THE WAY YOUR HEART BEATS AND IF
IT DOES IS IT WATERED DOWN BECAUSE OF BEFORE
AND I WANT TO KNOW IF MY WORDS HAVE THE SAME
EFFECT ON YOU AS YOURS ON ME AND I WANT TO SWIM
in the James River and forget how to sway my limbs around to float

this is not a love poem
this is not an "I miss you, come back" poem
this is a confession
this is a love letter
written on the palms of my hands because I know
you'll never get over how badly they shake

maybe I'm confused or lovesick or homesick
for a home that can only be found inside of warm chests
but I needed to write this for someone, for myself

maybe my questions don't need answers,
maybe they just need to be heard.

Jan 2014 allison joy

my body

Jan 2014 allison joy

berry

my body

this is a series of brief letters to the pieces of my body

dear body,
we don't always work together very well,
but i swear i am trying.

dear hands,
the callouses and crescent moons in your palms
will not be for nothing.

dear knuckles,
aren't you tired of painting yourselves black & blue
every time words fall short of the fire burning behind my sternum?

dear feet,
you know better than to follow roads that lead to dead ends.
there are better places for us to go.

dear eyes,
you have sunken so far into my skull
it shocks me you see anything at all anymore.
you're fixated on shades of gray
but i promise the world will regain its color soon.

dear knees,
stop crawling.
this broken glass is from his bottles.
get up. no more blood.

dear shoulders,
it was never your burden to carry. let it fall,
and try your hardest not to feel guilty.

dear neck,
his hands will never make a home here,
and you are worth more than one night of empty bruises.

dear spine,
stop waiting to be warmed by fingers
that would reach for another body if they could.

dear tears,
do not waste yourselves.

dear ears,
you have been filled with ghost songs for too long.
stop listening for things no one is saying -
it will make life much simpler.

dear mouth,
i know these secrets have been threatening to break my teeth
but please do not open your gates. i am not ready.

dear skin,
we have never been close friends.
i am sorry for the scars.
i am trying to learn how to be comfortable in you.

dear mind,
if i could wish you into an etch-a-sketch
and shake you clean of these bad memories i would.

dear heart,
i hope you can forgive me for being so careless.
i feel how tired you are. rest is on its way.

dear body,
you will one day see a grave,
but it must not be by your own hands.

- m.f.

Jan 2014 allison joy

sleeping habits

Jan 2014 allison joy

berry

sleeping habits

i still remember the first night we fell asleep on the phone together. i don't recall why you were crying and i'm sorry that you probably do. but i sang to you. i sang to you until you were silent. and that became a ritual for us. my voice carried you into dreams and i had never felt so important before. i didn't know it was possible to think the way someone snored was cute but night after night you proved me wrong. the moments before sleep were occupied by conversations of the future we wanted to build. we talked about being together in our bed in our house someday. i conjured up countless images of memories yet to be made that served as pictures on the pages of stories you told me. those images are still stuck to the walls of my skull, clinging to them as if to say, "but he promised." every time i try to peel them off they scream. i told you from the beginning the way promises tie my stomach in knots and most of the time you were careful. but at 4am when my voice was drowning in sobs i let you tell me you weren't going anywhere. you told me to breathe, suddenly i could. and you kept doing stupid little things until i gave in and laughed. i felt you smile. promises still made me feel sick. but i needed your consistency. the nights i had to fall asleep without you were hell. they always turned into red-eyed mornings where i watched the sun rise before managing only a few hours of dreamless sleep. i always woke up tired. i looked for you in other voices but none of them fit. your promises still lingered in my head. you said my heart would never be broken again, and i know this is not your fault, but i have been picking glass from my lungs for 17 days and the bleeding hasn't stopped.

- m.f

Jan 2014 allison joy

how

Jan 2014 allison joy

whyshouldiknow

how

(pt. 1)

how?
how could i not have known?
how come you didn't tell me?
you trust me,
right?
i would have helped.
maybe that's why.

she said they were,
i said i would punch them in the face.
she said it wouldn't help,
i said i didn't care.
she said it would make it worse,
i said okay, fine. i won't.

how did you hide it so well?
how come no one knew?
it happened all the time.
how is everyone so blind?
no one knew.
or if they did,
they
didn't
care.
i care.

(pt. 2)

i care.
and i didn't know.
i would do something,
and i didn't know.
i would help,
and i didn't know.
i would figure out a way,
and i didn't know.
i would stop it,
and i didn't know.

the first time i cried
you said you didn't tell me
because you were afraid.
you were afraid
something like this would happen.
you were afraid that
i would be scared and hurt
and sad
and try to help.

maybe it's better
because you learned the lesson yourself
maybe you wouldn't have
if it hadn't gotten so bad.

i still wish you had told me.
why didn't you tell me?
how?

Jan 2014 allison joy

look up, look up //

Jan 2014 allison joy

wounded

look up, look up //

i speak to the night and she always speaks back
lending me whispers and words to rend my weaving thoughts
in that moment between dreaming and sleep;
the one that lasts a life age
near the precipice, the one that undesirably breaks you free
ever so slightly
and then suddenly (maybe)
rips you away from the world that melds the real
and unreal
the true and the false
the dream and those harsh undreamt realities
that exist in all times, but never seem real when you’re free of their clutches.
we are one, we are all connected
our synapses are linked, our electrons shared,
our every thought a memory,
shooting through space like lightning
and written in the stars on our darkest of days

Dec 2013 allison joy

letting go

Dec 2013 allison joy

jamie

letting go

letting go
it’s so ******* annoying how i still can remember exactly how many freckles you have, and how many grains of sugar in your coffee you always add. every place i go has your shadow following me, and it is only after five minutes on the bus that i realize i’m sitting where you used to sit. you are stuck on me like lint on fabric and i have no money to buy a lint roller. parts of you are still fidgeting under my skin and we are still in physical contact even though you are five thousand miles away. we are touching even when we are not touching. welcome to the world of irony. you know, this is like stepping onto thin ice with iron weights attached to your ankles. this is holding up a lit match and going down a tunnel asking for Death. this is walking up to you and presenting my white, creamy neck and waiting for you to snap it. i just want to bleed, you know? stop twisting the **** knife in my heart. everyday i walk on crushed eggshells when all i want to do is bruise my knuckles and bleed out in front of your house, in front of Her. you keep asking me to let go, let go let go let go let go and i want to laugh. you are sewn onto my skin, you are on my teeth, you are in my lips. you are here, you are there, you are EVERYWHERE. how about i tattoo the exact words you used when you told me that my thighs needed to sign the divorce papers, or when you told me i needed a face transplant, on your skin, then told you to rub it off only with sandpaper? how long would it take, then? most of the time i feel like i am the gas station, standing in the middle of nowhere, saying ‘take me. here, take this part. take me, take me, take me.’ to everyone who stops by. and so they do. and so i fall apart. i self identify as the finger that keeps touching a naked flame and burning myself each time. i also self identify as a being stuck in a skin that does not fit me. you are like the glass shards that are impaled in my mind, so clingy, yet refuse to acknowledge my existence. i want to splash buckets of paint on white walls without seeing your face inside, and i want to be static once again without hearing your voice. i want to be able to rub you off my skin with sandpaper, burn you off with fire, peel you off my scalp, but i can’t. i can’t. i can’t i can’t, because in the famous words of Kate Moss, 'you're in my veins, you ****'.

Dec 2013 allison joy

two sad. 10w

Dec 2013 allison joy

soul in torment

two sad. 10w

y
o
u
took
away
my tears
replacing
them with
your
own.