I am black lace kissed with stardust
You are brilliant, well loved, faded tie-dye
Leaving the smell of campfires, afternoon naps
fresh showers, and sleepy smiles in your wake  
Bonfire flames licking the space between our skin
Heart beat rhythms drive the music
To sway against our heartstrings
Connected.
Summer rain runs down us steaming
Feel your heat getting closer
warming my bones
melting my center
A shiver runs through me
So in tune, I pulse for you
Aching with the distance
That seems to always separate
Our good timing

he brought me flowers on our first date.  
I had never gotten flowers before

he brought me flowers on our second date

       I tell him he shouldn't have while smiling    expecting nothing more

he brought me flowers on our third date
    I tell him he needs to save his money..     this can't be sustainable

he brought me flowers on our fourth date

   I tell him he shouldn't waste his money on me

     not that the flowers aren't beautiful or
       appreciated I just worry he'll regret being so generous to someone that doesn't deserve it      

he brought me flowers on our fifth date

 I tell him he can't keep buying me flowers and ask him why would he waste his money on me?  

    he just shrugs and says pretty girls deserve flowers, it's worth it to me  as if it were that simple

I come home from our sixth date
  I stop and look around my home, filled with flowers, another bouquet in my arms

  apprehensive to trust this could be my new normal; consistent, loving, kindness without expectations, heart on your sleeve, gentle, earnest

     and to think that maybe, just maybe, after all this time

I might deserve it

 that maybe, just maybe

 I might be worth it

I wrote I love you in the sand at the beach
Tide swallowed the words and drowned them
But the waves were not the reason for impeding speech
My awkward asocial character is the one to condemn
  Now the words are gone like the tearstains on my sheets that I have just  bleached.

Why is hellopoetry.com black and white? I've always wondered about this... why my colorful photographs are required to travel back in time. How does this effect the poetry in any way, shape, or form? But I understand the wisdom of this design now. And it sets a great metaphor for all of the people of the pen involved in this truly noble motion, this secret society for people with passion, talent, and troubled minds and souls. Hello Poetry is black and white not because it has to be monochromatic and modern, but because us poets fill these pages with enough inovativeness and color already with our words, ideas, thoughts, songs, senryus, ballads, heartbreaks, insecurities, that adding literal color to this website would be overwhelming. These soft undertones of gray, black, and white may be considered drab and depressing to some, but to us poets it represents timelessness. And this is probably why we are all here. Hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, or even yearly publishing poems. Because we all know we are not going to live forever, and we are so entirely insignificant in the broad scheme of things and of the universe itself, that it is a bit comforting and helpful to have this coping mechanism or soft blankie to calm our fears, that this literature we write, however insignificant it may be, is absolutley permanent. And that maybe someday it will be remembered so a small bit of us may live on. Tom Riddle knew the needs and wants of man kind before anybody else realized it. Maybe he was just trying to cope with the fact that he is insignificant. These poems are all our Horcruxes so *viveamus per camenam nostram.

Ran outside, no shoes
Hot tears, cold wind, breathe it in
Realizations

What's Mickey without Minnie?
What's Tigger without Pooh?
What's Donald without Daisy?
What's me without you?

When Peter Pan can't fly
And when Simba never roars
When Alice can't
fit through small doors

And when Dumbo's ears
Are small
And when happily ever after
Isn't true

**That's when I'll stop loving you.

Roses are red
Violets are blue
Tulips are yellow
Leaves are green
My body resembles
An expensive flower bouquet
Bruises swell
Blood collects
But my lips are sealed
Want it to end
At all costs
I'd have no regrets
Thinking about my death
Makes me feel alive
A new blossom is added to the
Vast collection
When I do or say something wrong
Too bad these prized blooms
Are always so carefully placed
Almost as if to hide them
From everyone
Leaves, tulips, and violets
Are artfully arranged
On my legs, on my chest,
On my back, and on my neck
I'm wrong they're right
No use putting up a fight
I'm petrified that if I do try to fight once more
Real flowers will be laid on my grave instead of my skin
Where I will rest forevermore.

You are never together, you are simply alone with somebody else.

I wanted to be    
      With him all the  
                      Time, wanted the            
         Taste of his lips
          On mine, his    
                   Roaming fingers
    On my
                   hungry skin.

His fire
                          to thaw  
                                    my
                                                ice.

Your veins are the roads I will travel
As I unfold your body
And plot each point with a fingerprint
I try to leave the land
The way I found it
But a trip always changes the traveler
And I don't want to go home.

You miss people
When they are gone
When they are so gone that
You can't believe it
After they've been away so long that the photographs that you
Have of them start
To feel intangible
When you start to
Think you made
Them up in your head that
They never laid in your bed...

He sits there
A fresh new canvas
Ready for memories to be painted on him
Wanting me to paint him
My hand shakes
Wanting the memories to be beautiful
I step forth
Ready to create a masterpiece
My paintbrush trembles with anticipation

There is nothing greater,
Than a cardboard box,
So clean, nice, simple,
And yet so full of potential,
There need to be more boxes in the world,
They have a simple beauty about them,
They don’t pretend or try to be something else,
They are just boxes,
And I love them for who they are,
And for what they could be,
I love them in any size, shape, and color,
They represent the acceptance,
That people should show to each other,
When I first moved,
I was devastated,
I had no friends,
The only thing that cheered me up,
Was the Box,
It was The Box from our refrigerator,
It was huge,
So big, two people could fit inside if they wanted to,
But I was the only person who went inside that box
Strangely enough,
But I loved it,
And since I had no friends I drew some on the inside of that box,
It was my special place,
My sanctuary if you will,
I had so much fun in The Box,
All my box friends loved me,
But about a month after I received the box,
I came home from school, with my art project in hand; ready to show my friends,
I walked into my room,
And I immediately cried,
The Box was gone,
My friends and every memory I had in there just gone,
I ran to my mother and asked her with tears streaming down my face,
“Where is Box?” She said she threw it away along with all the rest of the garbage,
My breath caught,
Box? Garbage?
I began crying again,
She responded by telling me to shut up,
And to stop acting like such a child,
I never forgot that,
How she just treated Box as if it was something meaningless,
And not worth anything,
When I had loved it so dearly,
Cherished every moment I had with it,
I just wish us humans,
Treated each other the same way I treated,
The Box.

Trying on my sister’s makeup at six years old,
Seemed like the coolest thing,
Using all sorts of crayons for your eyes in different colors,
Like the ones included in my $1.75 coloring book,
I was trying to be beautiful,
But I knew I didn’t need it,
Using mascara on my hair,
Using extensions to make my hair longer,
Using blush as eye shadow,
Drawing on red cheeks with lipstick,
Taking her size B bra and stuffing it with toilet paper,
Trying on heels because I want to be taller,
Putting on a dress and finally be able to fill it out with my stuffed bra,
I thought I was beautiful,
Even though I probably looked like a carnival clown,
10 years later,
I know how to use makeup,
I use mascara on my eyelashes,
I use eyeliner for my eyes,
I use blush for my cheeks,
I use lipstick for my lips,
I have a double D bra and fill it without toilet paper,
I own heels but I can’t wear them because I am too tall,
I have hair to my waist,
I’m still trying to be beautiful,
But I now won’t show my face without makeup,
I wear a mask hoping someone will remove it,
To tell me I don’t need it,
But they don’t because I do,
Because in my eyes,
I still look like a carnival clown.

I cry because happiness is a harder concept to grasp than sorrow.
Because sorrow greets me as an old friend.
Fondly reminding me of my mistakes,
my flaws, and my current inner desolation.
Reminding me of how I failed
and how I cannot fix my mistakes.
While we reminisce over a bottle of melancholia
and a plate of regret.
Leaving me with yet another notch on my belt
of nights I cried myself to sleep
People pass you by because
pretending everything is alright is more
convenient than noticing they are broken.
They are the people that hide their silent tears
at the back of a closet and bury broken smiles
into the corner of a sock drawer.
But soon …There won’t be enough room
for the hidden emotions that you think are irrelevant
and can be dealt with another day,
soon every emotion you hid will come out of the closet
and show its face in the most unpleasant way.
Tears. You can’t escape them.
I cry because she cries,
my best friend, drowning in her own sorrow,
I cannot help but drown with her.
For what is a friend if that friend will not jump
into the murky depth we call depression, sinking ever deeper?
At least we sink together.
Treading conformity, stress, humiliation,
we tread together.
As we sink deeper, we try to grasp
at the bubbles of happiness escaping our lips,
somehow bring them back.
We can’t, because once they’re lost no amount
of pretending can give us the air we sorely need
or the fake smiles to get by without question, day by day.
But at least, we drown together.
So many times I have looked out to a warm sunset
and felt chilled to the bone.
Because if I let go of the railing, life would go on.
Because if I did not exist right now nothing
in the world would change.
It would just erase any memory of all the ***** ups
I collected like stamps and baseball cards.
Because no amount of blankets and soothing words
can warm the icy thought in the back of my head
whispering in the persuasive voice of a friend, “What’s the point?”
I cry for the people who don’t think they matter,
who think that turning to something
to relieve their pain will fix it.
I cry for the people who think
killing themselves will make them feel alive.
For the people who get lost trying to find themselves.
For the people who put on a mask
desperately waiting for someone to see through it.
And for the people who cut themselves
trying to become whole.
Breaking themselves down bit by bit,
holding all the pieces,
and waiting for someone to put them back together.

I cry because this entire explanation is just eloquently realizing that

I am sad.