I don’t have a problem with saying too little, you don’t have to carve inspiration into a health room desk or vandalize a bathroom stall to get me to tell him how I feel. I have a problem with acting as if it’s four a.m. all day long and forgetting that you don’t need to know about my every mood swing: my Sunday highs and Tuesdays lows and Thursday nothings. I think my biggest fault is bothering you to tell me all the thoughts that have yet to cross your mind (and maybe wishing they had.) I want you to want to know everything I feel at any given moment: what I thought of this evening’s sunset and how long it took me to fall asleep last night and why track two of my favorite album makes me feel like I’m in a dream. I want you to want me to know why you painted your bedroom walls yellow and how often you floss your teeth and which day of the week you feel happiest on. But most of all, I want to know everything you feel, even before you’ve felt it.

Here’s something you seldom hear: don’t always listen to your heart. Because if your heart is like mine, it’s often fickle and confused. Emotions aren’t always true, they may come and go with the wind. Feelings trick us into believing lies. You look in the mirror and feel inadequate. You hear something so many times that you start to believe it’s true. You take a situation and manipulate it till it’s something completely false. But it’s time you start listening to your head: you may not be in control of what you feel, but you are in control of how you handle those feelings. Look in the mirror and tell yourself, “I know I am beautiful.” Refuse to believe the lies. Remind yourself of your many wonderful qualities. Don’t read too far into things, take them as they are. Worrying doesn’t change tomorrow, it just makes today more troublesome. Decide to be happy. Decide to be okay. Don’t believe everything you feel.

I have walked these fields
I have known this land
And though the years have changed the face
The memory still stands

Of a time when things were simpler
Of a time when hope was pure
Of a time when changing weather
Was all of which we were unsure

And I have seen the sun rise
Over fields of green and gold
Now that view is just a memory
And I know I'm getting old

Can it be that earth is failing?
Can it be that light has dimmed?
Can it be that we've abandoned
all the life that we once lived?

     Is it any wonder
     that our children can't get over
     just the smallest of infractions
     when the world falls all around them?

     For constancy is foreign
     in a land of no intentions
     where a lost appreciation
     for sacredness of life abounds.

I cannot pretend
To understand it all
For as often as I wonder
Equal am I inclined to fall

For I am of a generation
Which forgets itself began,
Wanders aimlessly through atmosphere
And defiles its fellow man

And over weakness, few have triumphed;
Through affliction, few have prevailed
And reverence for creation
Is an instinct we have failed

But our days are not yet over
For this one hope stands unmoved:
We are still formed of the same dust
Whose strength our ancestry has proved.

     Is there any remnant
     of the spirit deep within us
     that might once again remember
     the great faith we once achieved?

     There is far greater meaning
     found in one hopeful sentiment
     than in a thousand shouting voices
     denying all things once believed.

I have been busy scraping the last bits and pieces of you from the edges my heart
and from the cracks in the side walk or our old favorite restaurants
but
it didnt take me long to realize
working hands cannot keep a wandering mind, distracted