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Annie Jul 2013
I still talk to you every night
right before I go to sleep,
as if that will bring you back.
I know you can hear me,
or so I hope you can. I hope
you're at peace and laughing
at my incomplete thoughts
and silly mistakes. I wish
you were here to make these
mistakes with me and to
respond when I ask you
what's new. But for now I'll stick to
having one-sided conversations with
you in the dark, always ending with
"how're you doing lately? I hope it's heaven."
Annie Jul 2013
We associate death
with peace
but what if life
is the most
peaceful thing
we ever experience?
Annie Jul 2013
Would you be able to
tell that this was a
poem
if it was not spaced
out like so?
Is it even a poem
now?

Poetry is not simply
rhyme schemes and
counting syllables,
it's raw emotion
that leaks out in
words.

Poetry is self
expression, placed
on a page for the
world to view.

Poetry is the
deepest thought you
have, kept to yourself.

Poetry is a trivial
conversation brought
to life by a rearrangement
of letters and phrases.

You are a poet,
and in the same moment,
you are a poem.
Annie Jul 2013
With thoughts as scattered as the morning sun,
the impatient breeze dances in my lungs.
The melodies of birds spoken in tongues;
wisps of clouds are constantly on the run.
The leaves are the signs of a battle won
between the laurels and the air that hung.
The fading moon tells a story unsung
and the sky awakes as the lonely one.
Constant movement becomes reality.
Consumed with both the future and the past,
Disconnected from present mentality.
A broken relationship with nature;
it’s the one thing we hope we don’t outlast,
trust to withstand our own brutality.
(School sonnet assignment)
Annie Jul 2013
A glimpse of light travelling through the air,
while chased by time, it can never quite win.
The morning ends and the day can begin.
Shadows that are shifting from here to there,
move on the walls in the shape of despair.
The lies that the sky tells are a sin;
promise forever but have never been.
The whispers among the trees seem to swear
and curse about action and destruction.
We fail to notice the impending end,
caught up in the money and corruption.
Between dawn and dusk the city awakes,
but it can never seem to comprehend
its future of infinite construction.
(School sonnet assignment)
Annie Jul 2013
The wind gets colder as the sun recedes
And marks the first sign of the ending day.
Minds go numb and people’s thoughts will decay.
Slip to bed and let their bodies concede
To the dreams and nightmares that come with greed.
The stars emerge as memories replay,
The constellations are now on display.
As minds lose focus and the night proceeds,
The attention shifts towards current troubles.
And rather than help, we choose to ignore
The simple answers that solve the struggle.
The birds laugh as we argue and quarrel
Over issues that are petty at the core;
We can’t see past the lining of rubble.
(School sonnet assignment)
Annie May 2014
People always clap for the wrong reasons,
And the best at ****** are those who preach against it.  
Evil is not intrinsic. It’s fashioned.  
I believe in ghosts, but we create them. We haunt ourselves.  
There’s a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out.  
I talk to God but the sky is empty;
This love is silent.  
It’s exponentially bigger than you think;
It’s what you feel, but can’t articulate out loud.  

Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle.  
And neither the angels in the heaven above nor the demons down under the sea
Or the ghosts inside of me
Ever told me that grief felt so like fear.  
It’s easier to floss with barbed wire than
Admit that we love evil too well to give it up.  
Youth is a blunder, old age a regret;
But you cannot find peace by avoiding life.  

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
To struggle against this stupidity,  
I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world.  
The troublemakers are just a handful,  
And if our times are difficult and perplexing,
We become what we think.
The earth has music for those who listen;
There are times when the wolves are silent and the moon is howling.  
Nature is a haunted house—but Art—
Is not a thing, it is a way;
A parasitic on life.  
It is easy to fool the eye,
But art is the lie that enables us to realize the truth.  
We are killing a part of our souls
Every whisper of every waking hour,
And none of it seems real to me,
But everyone’s to blame.  

I have been learning how to die:  
My ribs are poking through and my coat is getting thin.  
Love lies hidden in every rose,
It’s a restless hungry feeling that don’t mean no one no good.  
Nothing is permanent in this wicked world;
You must let them go, they were born to go.  
There was never meant to be clarity.  
Let nothing disturb you; let nothing frighten you.  

When the wind blows, the grass bends;
There are so many fragile things after all.  
The earth breathes melodies in the wind,  
But those songs and bells were the laughter of guns
And their echoes are truly endless.
You said I should learn to sing along,
There’s paranoia in your veins.

Stop wearing your wishbone where your backbone ought to be,
The world is filled with broken things.
You must have chaos within you,
You can turn a phrase into a weapon.  
Words are the most powerful drug used by mankind;
I always have to justify how my tongue dances:
I bite my tongue and torch my dreams.  

When people don’t express themselves, they die one piece at a time;
To live is the rarest thing in the world.
The fear of death follows from the fear of life,  
And sometimes I can hear my bones straining under  
The weight of all the lives I’m not living.  
You cannot find peace by avoiding life.
The only way out of the labyrinth of suffering is to
Not let your fire go out.    

Love is always open arms;
Hate is too great a burden to bear.
I leave my heart open but it stays right here empty for days.
I still want to drown whenever you leave,
But in the end you can’t always choose what to keep.  
Everything must be made as simple as possible,  
Yet fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living.  

We must be careful about what we pretend to be,  
The first time someone shows you who they are, believe them.  
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored,  
Everything you can imagine is real.  
It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live:  
To those who will see, the world waits.  
The sun only comes up to humiliate you,  
But the planet is fine. The people are ******.

You don’t forget the face of the person who was your last hope,  
They can make your thoughts as heavy as branches after a storm.  
He had preserved the best part of her  
And made it his own: the principle of her scent.
He told how “the heavy smell of flower petals stroked the walls of my lungs.”
But ghosts have a way of misleading you.  
We are all haunted, all of us, by things we can see and feel and guess at,  
And many more things that we can’t.  
We all carry, inside us, people who came before us.  

You don’t need water to feel like you’re drowning, do you?
Your hands went cold in mine and I’m still searching for warmth;  
Nothing burns like the cold.  
For when all else is done, only words remain. Words endure.  
The future depends on what we do in the present,  
The time will never be just right.  
Question the world and don’t wait for a reply
Don’t be fooled by the words of deceit,
Don’t let her stick it to your heart so hard.

Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple:
When you cease to exist who will you blame?
Everyone I know is gone, and I barely know myself.
cento
Annie Jul 2013
The earth cracked under every step he took,
weighed down with the burdens of tomorrow;
self-involved, caught up in his own sorrow.
See, he wouldn't even bother to look
in the eyes of others, he was a crook,
stealing hope, leaving only the shadow
of a once happy soul, now left hollow.
He's gone through every excuse in the book,
explaining why he has the right to hurt
she who let him be the sun in her sky.
She never let anyone see her cry;
upon seeing weakness, she would revert
to building a wall nobody could climb
or ever break down, protecting her heart.
(failed sonnet attempt)
run
Annie Jul 2013
run
It's been four years, yet it feels
like it was only yesterday
that I heard your giggle erupt
from behind me while we ran.

We were running from everything,
there was no one to chase us
except our pasts and our futures.

We were running from old age
and sickness and responsibility.
We were running from rules
and friendships and love.

But we didn't know that the
further you get from one thing,
the closer you get to something else.

We were running from joy and
youth and didn't know we were
headed straight for fear and grief.

That day you ran away from me,
our paths never crossed again
and they never will.

That day you ran towards peace
and forgiveness and acceptance,
and I ran straight for sorrow
and a life filled with heartache.

I don't run anymore.
Annie Jul 2013
She painted him
sunsets and mountains
and love, to try to take
the grief away.

She wrote words of
inspiration and hope
and complexity
to show him how simple
happiness could be.

But she failed to see
how deep his sorrow went,
and she couldn't draw a
rope long enough to rescue
him and every escape she tried
to write for him led to a dead
end, and he was left to
sit there and be consumed
by every malicious thought
ever to exist.
Annie Jul 2013
A silent night with distant screams,
she swore someone must have heard her pleas.
But still her nightmare stumbles through the door
filled with rage and grief and more.
One drunken step from side to side,
and in this moment she tries to hide.
A day filled up with laughs and light
has transformed into a dreadful night.
His voice bellows from outside her door
words slurred together, fright restored.
She can smell the whiskey and *** on his breath
and so she leans down and prays for death.
She knows too well what is coming next:
one more bruise along her neck.
Some children collect coins and silver dollars,
while she keeps these bruises around her collar.
A prized collection, he takes much pride
in leaving his mark and leaving her to cry.
People asked about the shadows on her arms and face,
but she covered them well with linen and lace.
It's been five years since this all began
and she can't bring herself to trust a single man.
His presence still haunts her, even though he's "changed"
nothing can erase those hits exchanged.
Her will to live is now slipping slowly,
why should she live in a world so lonely?
So the girl who cried out for help that time
now sits alone and makes these rhymes,
quietly waiting on her time to die.
Annie Mar 2014
You only seem to care for me when I'm happy,
with one hint of a frown I know you'll be gone.
I thought this would be good for me, that
I would learn to be happy and full of smiles.
But I can't make my thoughts disappear and you
don't seem to understand that smiling no longer
means happiness for me anymore.

Smiling means convincing you that I'm okay
when that's the last thing I am.

Smiling means being normal when you want me
to be and not letting you see that I can't breathe.

**Smiling means suffocating.
can not give a **** enough to read this over srry
so
Annie Apr 2015
so
I'm not going back to that place.

I can feel the darkness fighting to take over
but I'm stronger now.

That's what I tell myself these days.
I am so tired of fighting.
So tired of trying.
So so tired.
Annie Aug 2013
I have no right to grieve
for someone who isn't even
gone yet.

I have no reason to be sad,
when I am not the one
suffering.

Yet every day I struggle with
the same thoughts, and I fight
the same nightmares.

I have no comfort anymore, no
one to help me through; so I sit here
upset by someone else's problems.
Annie Oct 2013
Your smile still reaches your eyes,
and the corners never try to drag you down.
You walk with a confidence I never had,
a piercing glare that dares me to give in to you.

Do you know how lucky you are?
To have happy thoughts more than those filled with grief?
Have you ever known pain?
I hope you never do; I never want to see
the happiness leak from your body.

I think I'm drawn to you because you're everything
I never allowed myself to be.
Maybe what I've gone through has been worth
it if you never have to suffer the same.

Stay young.
Stay happy.
Annie Mar 2014
Being broken isn't fun, it's not beautiful, and
it won't make people love you.

Pushing people away doesn't somehow
make everyone care like you think it will,
it only hurts them when you never seem to make time for them.

Denying your problems isn't a sign of being strong,
it's being so weak that you can't even look yourself in the mirror.

And that. Not being able to look yourself in the
mirror doesn't make you tragically beautiful,
it tears you apart and destroys everyone around you.

You make excuse after excuse but one day people
are going to start giving up on you,
and it will be your own **** fault.

But you won't be able to see that you caused
all of this, because you're too busy trying to be
hopelessly broken.
Annie Sep 2013
It's funny how memories work,
some are nice and soft like
the sweater you clung to in the
fifth grade when your family
stopped giving out hugs.

But others feel like they're
ripping out a vital *****,
typically your heart, and you
don't know what to do because
you never went to med school
like your parents always wanted.

You're sitting in your room on
the phone and then all of a sudden
a tornado is outside your window
and your ceiling is leaking and
you can hear the wind screaming
for you to just give up already.

The only time you've ever picked
up a hammer was in woodshop in
seventh grade but instead of making
a chess board, it's banging against
every wall in your head and a
chainsaw is cutting up your thoughts.

And so you get through this daily
hell the only way you know: by
counting breaths and dripping
tears on the coat of man's best
friend as you drift to sleep.
Annie Aug 2013
A breath caught between her
lungs and her lips; she's unwilling
to say the words that could set her
free, or further imprison her
in her own mind. A stutter that
reflects her brain whirring at
impossible speeds, unable to
keep up with her emotions.
She tries to let you know how
she's suffering, but the syllables
never quite fit together and the
letters can't seem to form the right
sentences; and so she seeks solace
in herself when overcome by the darkness.
Annie May 2015
Imagine a building falling on top of you,
first it crushes your bones
then it spreads your brain a couple blocks over
and leaves pieces of you scattered
so far apart and in such tiny fragments
that they can't tell if that is part of your
finger or trash that someone was too
careless to throw away.

Now imagine floating on a cloud
so light that you think your breath
is heavier than your body, and
every thought is so happy it makes
you want to cry because you never
knew life could be that good.

Combine the two and you enter
a perpetual state of confusion, of
too many emotions in the wrong
time and the wrong place.

Combine the two and prepare
to see your life falling apart
and coming together and prepare
to lose everything that you aren't
even sure you care about.
Annie Jul 2013
Don't fall in love
with the boy who
stays up until
2 am, for he
is thinking about
too many things.

He's contemplating
how the world works
and trying to figure out
what makes each
person tick.

He's searching for
answers in the depths
of the ocean when he
should be looking in the
your eyes.

He focused on knowing
something about everyone,
so he'll never have time
to know everything about
someone, even on those
sleepless 2 am nights.
Annie Jul 2013
Your best friend is laying down
in the casket before you
and it's all wrong.

She's wearing a dress, yet
everyone knew that
the only time she wore
one was to mock those
who "colored inside the lines."

Her hair is up, but she
always had it down
to cover her flaws and
the distant look in her eyes.

Her lips are in a straight line,
but she was known as
the girl who would be laughing
at her own funeral, and here
she was, tightlipped.

Looking at her body that
would soon only leave
bones behind, it was
obvious that nobody ever
looked past the skin deep
features, nobody took notice
of a girl who strove to
blend in, and succeeded.
Annie Dec 2014
Your hands in mine
Your lips on my neck
Your breath heavy, your eyes begging
Too much begging

Too far

You're gone now
I can't find my clothes
I can't find my dignity
I lost myself

Too far
Annie Jul 2013
Her hands glide across
her own collarbone,
hoping she'll find that
your fingers still remain.
But no trace is left
from that night she
will forever remember,
and the night that you
drink to forget.
Annie Jul 2013
She has a twisted sense of what’s beautiful,
carving feelings into her skin and calling it art;
the kind of girl that thinks more than she breathes.
She thinks maybe writing will calm her nerves,
so she lets the words flow from her pen,
but her heart still aches the same.
Do you have the same fascination with words
as you once shared with her,
or have you moved on from that too?
She keeps the books you gave her because she
can see where your fingers traced the page,
mesmerized by the words of someone else’s story.
She tragically waits for a boy who never
really cared about the words she wrote,
and will never care about her.
Annie Apr 2015
Loud voices.

Hurried walks.

Too much talking,
not enough listening.

Why shouldn't
I
simply
d
   e
       t
           a
                c
                      h

myself completely?
Annie Jul 2013
She has infinite words
at her fingertips, but
she can't find the right
combination of letters and
balance of syllables to
describe the way her heart
aches every moment of the day.
Annie Aug 2013
I honestly don't know
how much longer
I can keep
pretending

that I am strong enough

that I  care enough

that I am human.
Annie Jul 2013
Her phone has killed too many
people, taken hopes and dreams
along with it.

Her phone has made people sick,
and kept them in the hospital
endlessly.

Her phone has given away secrets,
ones she wishes she'd never told.

It has been the end of many
friendships and the start of
failed romances.

A simple call that turned her
world upside down forever,
a few words that tore at her
will to live.

Now she's bound to it inexplicably,
unwillingly attached to the
only source of grief in her life.
Annie Jul 2013
I told him I felt lost and so
he handed me a map
and told me to drive
wherever my heart leads me.

His face didn't
show an ounce of surprise
when I pulled up to his
driveway.
Annie May 2015
it's back.

the weight.
the fear building up between my eyebrows.
the tears constantly threatening to show.
the breathlessness between each breath.

i'm tired of fighting this alone.
i don't want to be strong anymore,
i don't want to hold it together for one more second.

every heartbeat is a miracle.
Annie Sep 2013
You yearn for someone to care
about you so much that it hurts,
for someone that listens more
than they give their opinion.

You dream of a boy that is
capable of keeping you together,
even though you know you
are the only one responsible.

You've never known love,
raised by a man that taught
you to fear touch and quick
movement and stale breath.

You've known hatred though,
your mother passed down
self-loathing and you've
become a professional by now.

Is it still possible to turn a
self-loathing person
into a
self-loving person?

You've missed your chance
to get help, and now you
self medicate just to
numb yourself.

But numb is terrible.
You're still alive
when you're numb.
Annie Sep 2013
The hospital air lingers in her lungs;
it's heavier than it should be,
weighed down with screams, tears,
and last breaths.

She still carries them with her,
unable to shake that which vows
to heal. Funny how she's been sick
ever since she left.
Annie Aug 2013
You claim your heart doesn't work properly anymore,
it doesn't beat the same, and seems to have forgotten
its purpose. But don't you know that it was never
taught how to care, so it can't possibly be labeled as
broken now that it refuses to beat for someone else's
warm breath and crooked smile.

And so I carefully tear at your skin and gently shift
your ribs aside--you're so convinced that it's impossible to fix
and needs to be replaced. You expect me to insert a heart
that will love your body and not the boy who
broke you, but all I can find is an ***** that can
barely pump blood and has no feelings at all.

I'm sorry I couldn't fix your sadness, but I did manage
to give you a new heart, just like you asked.
Annie Apr 2015
I can't take a deep breath
I can't take a breath at all
teach me how
please help me I'm trying
but my lungs can't keep working
like this I can't keep working
like
this.
Annie Oct 2013
only the good die young so i know i've got some time to ****
Annie Sep 2013
Arms too thin for her already
frail body, a frame that is so
unbelievably weak, yet still
stronger than her mind.

A couple scratches on her
arms from when her thoughts
took control, a few clumsy
bruises from her parents
when they tried to fix her.

And she still has the crooked
grin, that smirk that just
screams self-confidence.
Or maybe it's simply to distract
anyone from looking at her
eyes, where grief and pain
attempt to hide in between the
shades of brown and green.
Eyes that have seen too much
but don't want anyone to know,
part of a face trying so hard
to be perfect enough for the
people who are so imperfect
themselves.
Annie Aug 2014
Holding hands is dangerous because at some point somebody has to let go.
Annie Sep 2013
my writing is ****.

that's it.
Annie Aug 2014
I hate how my dreams about you are always good.
I hate waking up from them.
I hate waking up.
Annie Dec 2014
the circles under my eyes are growing
i'm running out of makeup
i'm running out of excuses
Annie Sep 2013
She quiets her mind with
bad decisions and liquid courage.
Her thoughts slow down along
with her breathing, and her
heart misses a couple of beats.
The veins in her arms now
carry a death sentence
as her eyes lose focus.
She's found the perfect
formula for self-destruction.
Annie Nov 2013
People always clap for the wrong reasons,
And the best at ****** are those who preach against it.  
Evil is not intrinsic. It’s fashioned.  
I believe in ghosts, but we create them. We haunt ourselves.  
There’s a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out.  
I talk to God but the sky is empty;
This love is silent.  
It’s exponentially bigger than you think;
It’s what you feel, but can’t articulate out loud.  

Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle.  
And neither the angels in the heaven above nor the demons down under the sea
Or the ghosts inside of me
Ever told me that grief felt so like fear.  
It’s easier to floss with barbed wire than
Admit that we love evil too well to give it up.  
Youth is a blunder, old age a regret;
But you cannot find peace by avoiding life.  

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
To struggle against this stupidity,  
I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world.  
The troublemakers are just a handful,  
And if our times are difficult and perplexing,
We become what we think.
The earth has music for those who listen;
There are times when the wolves are silent and the moon is howling.  
Nature is a haunted house—but Art—
Is not a thing, it is a way;
A parasitic on life.  
It is easy to fool the eye,
But art is the lie that enables us to realize the truth.  
We are killing a part of our souls
Every whisper of every waking hour,
And none of it seems real to me,
But everyone’s to blame.
This is a cento, so the lines were all taken from different sources and authors.
Annie Sep 2013
I see sadness in the way you move, as if your only wish
is for the ground to open up and swallow you whole.

I see it in your shifting eyes-they move from my eyes to
the sky to the people surrounding you.

I can see how you yearn to be in someone else's skin;
how your bones ache to be free of your mind.

The corners of your mouth twitch when they try to
reach too high, as if they aren't strong enough to
hold up whatever is bringing you down.
Annie May 2015
i refuse to chase anyone anymore.
i used to think that it was brave to go
after what i wanted, that my confidence
would be taken in such a way that
would attract you even more;
but it just left me open and vulnerable
and alone when it turned out that
you never wanted me back.

but i'm not settling for your "sometimes".
your name doesn't make me smile anymore
and i'm making memories with other people:
better people.

I am not defined by your
inability to love me.
I will find someone who not only desires
me, but values me.
I'm not expecting someone to take away the bad,
I simply want someone to enjoy the good with.
I want to talk in whispers on a Tuesday afternoon
so we can hear the wind and laugh in the middle
of class because I remember something you said earlier.
I'm finally in a place where I can enjoy the world,
and I won't be held back by someone who can't enjoy me.
Annie Aug 2014
I fell for the way your words were
laced with hidden truths about myself.
But not in the good way--oh how I wish.
No, these truths revealed how guarded
I was and how you saw right through it.
You saw through my walls and
picked out my worst insecurities;
insults disguised as jokes outnumbered
any kind words coming from your lips.
You were toxic and your eyes
undressed me and all of my armor.
I kept coming back for more, begging you
to tell me something I didn't know about myself.
When you finally got tired of my story,
you were gone faster than you came and
I was left here questioning who I am.
****** late writing
Annie Aug 2014
Our first date was innocent and perfect and slow.
We talked for hours and I committed the way your hands felt to memory.
We kissed and I was nervous and you didn't push me.

The dates in between were a blur.
Casual hang outs we both knew were more.
I was truly happy.

But our fifth date was different.
It felt rushed and the look in your eyes was off.
We talked for hours again but this time you hit me.
We got into the back of my car and the next
morning I woke up feeling ***** and bruised.

By this point I knew you were not what I wanted.
I was no longer happy with you but you had an
unexplainable grip on me and I was practically
on my knees begging you to love me.

I did not like you, I did not like what you did to me.
You made me feel childish and insecure even
when I could see how you were simply using me.
But we were temporary, so I stayed.

On our last night, you told me you couldn't figure me
out and you never called me after that.
I guess in trying to protect myself I became a
mystery so complex you didn't want to bother.

And somehow, despite all the pain you put me through,
you leaving out of nowhere is what hurt me the most.
(not really a poem, just needed to get it out)
you
Annie Aug 2014
you
I hope you see something every day that
reminds you of me and I hope it kills you.

I hope you can't breathe when you hear my
name and I hope you can't stop thinking
about my laugh and how well you knew
my tone of voice.

I want you to regret that you can't hear
me talking to you this very second.

I want you to remember how I sang along to
every song because I didn't know the lyrics
but wanted to prove you wrong.

I want you to miss how stubborn I was
and I want you to regret ever letting me go.

I hope you think about pushing me away
and I hope it tears you apart.

— The End —