Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
I watched you write me love notes,
Appreciating the way you loop your y's
And the cursive that looks like graphite smoke
On an untouched canvas

The way you hold your hand is elegant,
Every movement fine, performed with grace
And you mutter what you're writing
Just to make sure it sounds perfect.

Sometimes, you scribe little poems outside the margin
Sweetness dripping like honey off tongues,
Enraptured by your words, spellbound
I'll fall into you
You were quick to calm--
To see things my way for once--
When you saw the bits.
I told my mother I found out
love is not what people say it is
in the leather-bound books
or the virtual screens today.

They say we should fall in love
with the idea of love and
"happily ever after"
will be until the end of our days.

My mother replied to me,
“Tell me son, what is love
in your eyes then?
What is love to your heart?”

My muttered answer to my mother
was, “What makes my heart race,
and what makes my heart sink,”
as if it should make sense to her.

Surprisingly, her reply to me
was this, “Don’t define love, son,
It is too powerful to define.
Let love define you—

That is where the true power lies.”
Oh! Anxiety,
wash over me.

Coat my body,
in hot chilly sweat.

My palms are waterfalls.
My feet are ice.
My armpits are needles.

Anxiety,
watch over me.

Forget the. . .
apparently it wasn't worth remembering.

Speed to where I need to be.
Ah ha! I recall what I forgot.
In order to be where I needed,
to be.

Anxiety,
listen to me.

And to the whispers,
that taunt and harass me.

Wait,
Listen to them first.
Then me.

Anxiety.
Please leave.
I am the poem
On the roof of your mouth
Caught in your throat,
I am whirring in your stomach
In the soles of your shoes
In the ground beneath you.
I am everything you wish to say
To bring to the surface
And make tangible.
The whiskey in your hand makes you brave
Maybe this time you'll let me loose?
Maybe this time you'll open my cage door
And be honest with yourself?
Maybe not.
Imagine what we would be like
If we knew how to be honest
Without being drunk first.
Things that go 'bump' in the night
Should not really give one a fright.
It's the hole in each ear
That lets in the fear,
That, and the absence of light!
Dear 13 year old me,
You are no longer sitting in your bathroom imagining your life as an 18 year old.
Instead,  you are 18 sitting in your dorm room.
Did you imagine it like this?
This is a reminder that in 5 years you dyed your hair 5 different  colors,
lost friends you thought would be with you always,
and started University 8 hours from your hometown.
Within those short 5 years you managed to hurt your family repeatedly,
and then attempt to fix what you'd broken.
you discovered your passions, learned a few things about love, and
often times forgot to speak your mind.
When you read this next you may be 20, or 31.
You will think differently at that time, God I hope you do.
Widen your horizons, your perspective.
Please travel, and love even if you don't know how;
imagine things again. Don't be scared but take precautions.
Try and love your family. Please try,
for me.
Dye your hair, pierce things without letting your mom see.
And just please, please try to be happy.

— The End —