Deception or protection?
Is it a lie to deny
Or omit a commitment
Of the romantic kind?

To claim it's for his sake
Is a godly statement I won't make.
I've no hold over lives of men,
Yet by my choice I've changed one again.

Who by heartbreak? Who by betrayal?
Who by the murderous unfaithful?
It seems more deaths occur in the virtual
Than by those weapons wielded by the literal.

Who by knives in the front and back,
Who by fire, famine, plague, animal attack,
Who by crime, who on time, who during youth,
Who by abuse, who by noose- and who by truth?

I love more easily
In the winter,
When the only sun
Is a smile,
And any lack of warmth
Belongs to everyone.

I love more easily
In the cold,
With the frost and the rain,
When all my winter
Sweats and sweaters
Make me feel better
About myself,
Than in the summer,
When there are no excuses
Not to go out and make hay.

I wonder if I'm an ice queen,
Reveling in the ****** weather,
Or just an introvert who likes sleet
And the warmth of your company even better?

We were at war,
and now we're not.
We normal folk
don't hear sirens anymore-
but I know our boys
will always hear the booms.

We were at war,
it was the comma
in a sentence that goes on.
It's difficult to realize
that some of our big family
didn't pick up where they left off,
and some didn't pick up at all.

I'm the kind of girl who glows.
I've never admitted it
Or said or written it,
But I've always known.

I walk down the street,
And people look at me,
And I don't know why,
But it's not because I'm pretty.

I know how to shine,
It's an innate talent of mine.
I sparkle, and when I do,
The people around me sparkle too.

People see what I want them to,
And they all say I'll go far,
And it's not that that's not true-
In fact, I suppose I'm a star.

But the thing about stars
Is that they're lucky and bright
But there's lots more to them
Than being a graceful sight.

Stars hold themselves together,
And they're born with their deaths,
And you'll see them forever,
Long after their last breaths.

Stars light our nights from far away,
And they're never what they seem,
They're lonely, sad, strange and alien,
Infinite, vaporous beings.

Yes, I'm a star,
For all the reasons above,
No one sees beyond my light,
And almost none know the illusion of my love.

A name,
A face,
More ripples
In the lake.

I've never seen this man,
But I'll never be the same.
I am not the faintest ripple,
Though we've never met,

Though we're only close
In the second degree, if that;
Though I might sleep tonight
While others won't.

Those outermost waves
Are the ones for whom
He is just part of a number
Of casualties in the Middle East.

She dreamed of a stage
That was bigger than the world.
A stage big enough for all her fears,
High up enough for all her tears
To flow down, down, down.

She dreamed of a place
That could stand her sparkle,
That would understand
The words in her heart
And the silences between them.

She played, she sang,
She wrote away,
And never told a soul.
No, she never dared to hope-
She only dreamed.

And she'd watch people turn to stars,
At home, and on Hollywood Boulevard,
And her world was dark,
Inside herself
And she woke up every morning.

And her dreams were what kept her going,
And the ink that was her tears just kept flowing,
And when her family fell apart,
And when a "Crack!" came from her heart,
She'd put her earbuds in.

And she lived knowing
That one day the music would die,
That that sparkle in her eyes
Would dull for good,
And that she'd open her mouth and just rasp.

And every day
Her dream slipped farther away,
And the salt-waterline that came from her eyes
Kept growing and rising to meet her,
And she didn't know who would save her.

Today if anyone looked for her,
They would see a pair of hands above the water
Outstretched, protecting a big purple folder,
From a big puddle of pain and broken notes,
And maybe then they'd find her.

It hurts to put him first,
No matter the cost for you,
And to put yourself second
When you know he puts you there, too.

It hurts to come second,
Because he's your natural Number One,
But he's got a family who loves him-
And he's where you end up when you run.

It hurts because you'll never tell him that
Sometimes at night you flashback to crying alone,
In a room that doesn't feel like home,
And gluing yourself back together by morning.

It hurts because you're afraid
That what happened before will happen again,
That you'll need to be for someone else
What you yourself are still missing.

It hurts to come second,
And he never knew
How hard he'd have to try just
To keep from hurting you.

It hurts, and you'll probably never tell him
Because that's just not who you are,
And also because somewhere you know that
Who you're with is not the one who let you fall.

It hurts anyway.
It hurts coming second.
Write yourself some poetry,
Maybe learn a lesson:

Remember to be self- sufficient,
Because you're fragile and you're breakable;
And that that's your problem, not his,
And that as long as YOU have a choice-- choose him.

Remember that it's not so simple
When his Number Ones don't know you exist,
But what can you do, you feel like this
Because it hurts to come second.