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 Jan 2018
Eleanor Webster
I have a hole
Inside my chest
I slowly fill it up.
With laughter
With inside jokes
With love
With positivity posts.

Something heals.

Like puzzle pieces slotting,
I am home.
I wrote this as I was sitting in the library on a Tuesday. Someone with a stupid nickname- an inside joke- messaged my phone, and it made me smile and appreciate all the people around me who love me. A follow up from yesterday’s poem.
 Jan 2018
Eleanor Webster
The comforting warmth of a crowd
Never fails to amaze
Food and friends and *****
What more could a girl ask for

"Sexuality!" Somebody cries
And we groan
But we talk and talk anyway
We explore ourselves
Touch-starved children
Rejected by brothers and lovers
The pretty and the beloved of the world
So we reach out to each other
Curl into each other's affection
For we have so much love to give
And this-
this is the only place where we know
We can give it freely
For others will take
Take
Take
Until we are bled dry.

I hear of teenage parties
As if they are mythology
Of people hooking up
And falling out
Puking guts and gossip
Like there's no tomorrow

I'd much rather this
Using streetlamps to guide our hearts
Staring up at the stars and asking
What all of this means
Who all of us are
And what would happen if we were gone

Soon we will scatter
Like leaves in the autumn
We travel far and wide
But though we may be apart
We will never forget
The tree to which our roots belong.
This is one of my favourite old poems, dedicated to my group of friends from back home. I was going through a lot and they were there for me without even realising quite exactly what I was struggling with. Although we have all moved away now, I'm so privileged to keep my childhood friends close. They are a light in an ever-darkening world.
 Jan 2018
Eleanor Webster
Tick
Tick
Tick of a metronome
Everyone falls into their allotted place
Somehow in the chaos they all know the pace
of this tune
This humdrum waltz
Step one two step one two step one two step
Into a world of imagination and fun
I've always danced to my own tune
I've pirouetted and leaped, out of sync, out of time
And I've always been praised for not toeing the line but now
Somehow I wish I could force my heavy feet
Into this repetitive nonsensical beat
Of the collective, the herd
That I so desperately need
I'm not a genius, not a poet, not an enlightened teen
I'm an extroverted mess with an eagerness to please
But a stubborn refusal to dance to the beat in the past has made me
A social outcast
It's too late for me
To find my feet
Where they fit in this dance to the death
When life's only half lived
I've always called myself a ****** never realising how well it fit
And if you are proud of your uniqueness, you can't escape it
When you need to
Or want to
Fit in with the crowd
I'm too crazy or too tame
Too quiet or too loud
And only here with people
Who I just can't seem to get
I feel the accurate poignance
Of the title, 'misfit'.
A pretty self-explanatory poem, I feel. Inspired by a silent disco where I chose a different wavelength to the people around me.
 Jan 2018
Eleanor Webster
I never was a Gryffindor, I said.
Not for me the bravado of the every day,
The martyrdom of intersecting a bullets path
In fact, I did disdain of that reckless abandon.
I understood the slytherins and ravenclaws outwitting the shooter Before he shot
But whoever said you'd meet a hufflepuff in heaven was wrong,
Lord knows I wouldn't jump in front of a bullet for you
But I'd pull us both out the way.

I never was a Gryffindor, I said.
Not for me the pomp and prance of the self-assured, self-entitled Gryffindor,
In fact, I felt at home in any other house.
Ravenclaws do speak the truth, possess originality,
And slytherins are more trustworthy than you'd suspect.

I never was a Gryffindor, I said.
But there's a certain bravery in dancing on your own like everyone's Watching,
Because they are,
They're all watching you, some disdainful,
Some with humour in their eyes,
Some with their cameras out:
I winked at one, and stuck my middle fingers up at the other,
Because I look happier than anyone else in the crowd
And I'm with my friends
And God I love my friends
And God knows when our song comes on I'm going to scream it at The top of my lungs.
And soon we'd collapse but I said no
Dance like the world will end if you stop
Because it will
Because the glory will fade
Because they don't understand
This isn't a dance, it's a victory march
Showing everyone here
That I have dealt with their smirks and their cameras
And I have survived.
And I am unstoppable now.
Maybe I am a little bit Gryffindor, I thought, and smiled.
This is the first poem I ever wrote, so please be gentle! Context: I was about sixteen at a summer festival and me and my friends were essentially the only people dancing, so we got some funny looks; this kinda captures the Zeitgeist of a completely content and socially at ease me. This is a poem about self-acceptance and ignoring the judgement of others. Also Hogwarts houses. #hufflepuff4lyfe
 Jan 2018
Eleanor Webster
"I'd like to be a fly on the wall," you say.
Would you?
Would you really like to be privy to all
that drama and intrigue, without ever being noticed?
Sounds nice, I suppose.
But I'll let you in on a little secret-
That, my dears, is false advertising.
Truth is, people always notice flies
They just choose to ignore them
And lower their voices when you buzz by on sugar-spun wings of self-confidence-
Maybe it's just all in your head
Maybe you've misinterpreted things-behind kaleidoscope eyes
It always looks like there are more of them than you.

So you gain confidence
You hover on the fringes of their circle
And drone out a low hum of 'what've you been up to today?'
Or 'how're you?'
Or 'long day, huh?'
The response is offhand
A verbal flick of the wrist
Batting the ball back into your conversational court
Because coming at you with a fly swatter
Or a rolled up Cosmo magazine
Takes more effort than they're willing to give.

You buzz about some more
Hoping maybe the silence will entice them to engage
But no,
They can't hear your buzzing
Or they won't.
So instead you stand
Fly on the wall
Content with watching the light catch your wings
Repeatedly wringing your hands near your face
In a way they probably think is malevolent
I promise I'm not plotting-
I'm just juggling the weight of my loneliness
Maybe if I shift it from one palm to another
Somehow I will lighten the load.

Take comfort in this, little fly-
The sun makes your wings iridescent
And even though they'll never get close enough to see that, you can.
It's not a trick of the light
Your fractal eyes do not deceive you-
They are duplicate.
A poem about social exclusion.
 Jan 2018
Eleanor Webster
Take me back
Where all is muffled
Blanketed
Lights filtered through meshed pink
Sanctuary
Harsh sounds of existence slurred
Safe from harm

Ophelia, drowning in flowers
Escape a world I don't understand
Mottle my fingers I cannot see
Where I begin and the air ends

I wish to be this close to you again
Connected by a cord
That can never really be cut
Feed knowledge and experience
Into a pre-natal brain
Etch your wisdom into whorls
Thicken the pads on my fingers
Envelop me
The beginning and the end of my universe
My Dôn
Is it any wonder I cried when I left?

Take me back to a time before language
The only foetal words I know
Are the drum bass of my universe
I am, I am, I am,
And soon I will echo your confident staccato
I am, I am, I am
Okay.
I wrote this for my mother when I was going through a really rough time. She's the one person who always knows what to say, and always stands by me. I'm eternally grateful for her.

— The End —