Always put a smile on my face
Under every circumstance
These wonderful children
I've been blessed to be around
So much they've taught me
Mostly, love does not always need words.

The music inside my head
Never goes away
Sometimes it's a lovely melody
Sometimes it's in disarray

I never quiet my mind
Because that is where she lives-
My creative self,
Her home for all these years.

But lately she has been silent,
And I do not know why.
I wonder if she's broken,
If she's still alive.

I miss her everday,
Every beautiful moment.
She's been with me forever,
My own special poet.

I hope she will return,
She made me feel alive.
To my creative self-
You don't need to hide.

I want to feel alive again,
Writing poem after poem
She had all the words for me,
She made my mind a home.

She never moved
She never lived
She never existed.

She could have had the world.

The current brings me in safely
As I was drowning
And although I was deep
In the crystal clear water,
The waves coax me back to shore
Where you wait for me-
Arms wide open.

My feet touch the sand
And I run to you
Because you make me forget
About the past
About the high tide
That almost killed me.
And I am safe.

"Why don't you call?"
They ask,
Even though
Every time I do,
It's always something new.

I grew out of toxic behavior
I don't miss the screaming
And the emotional trauma.
She was always scheming.
And I believe in karma.

This life isn't easy.
I'd rather be alone.
But it's hard without-
A place to call home.

I remember the feeling.
Like I was getting rid
Of every foul thing inside me.
I would feel so-
Empty.
But at the time
It was better than feeling everything.
And sometimes I would just lay there
And I would cry.
I was so ashamed
Of my bathroom coping mechanisms.
Brush my teeth
So the acid wouldn't make them yellow.
Appearances seemed to be important.
Had to be thin,
Had to be empty.

I didn't realize then
That I was wasting away
That there was another way
To purge my feelings.
But I know now.
I know now.

You saved me.

I looked at the world around me,
I could see the future clearly,
So perfectly laid out.
I would be successful,
I wouldn't be alone.

I knew I had to jump,
Had to fall.
So I picked the deepest ocean I could find,
And I dove in
Thinking it would be easy to swim back up.

When I hit the rock bottom,
The last thing I saw-
Millions of people just like me,
Drowning and clawing towards the sky
For just one more feeling of life.

And even though we were together,
I had never felt more alone.

Is a poet still a poet
If they do not write?

A journal gathering dust,
But a yearning to write.
Am I still a poet
Without my inner light?

You're asleep.
And here I am laying in the dark,
I wonder to the world
How I became so lucky.

I have someone that understands me.
A partner,
A best friend,
A lover.

Your long eyelashes shade your eyes,
And your light breathing
Tells me you are at peace.
You wrapped your leg around me.

You woke up for a second.
You realized you weren't holding me,
And you adjusted
So I could slide into your embrace.

And now you're asleep.
Unaware to the words I am now writing.
You have become everything to me.
You are the before and after.

I never thought I would be this girl,
But I'm as cheesy as the rest of them-
Those in love.
Those with hope.

I walk through these days
In a blur
I question reality.
Feeling timeless
Although I am a creature of time.

And sometimes-
I wish I were an animal
Because they truly live without worry.
And then they die
But death doesn't stop them from living.

And I want that.
I want to live without the thought of death.
I don't want to die in a hospital bed like those before me.
I want to rage against the dying of the light
As Thomas once said.

And I want to love
And love deeply
And together there will be no time,
Just us.
Just until we are no more.

You're just as important to me
As I am to you.
So don't downplay yourself
As if you're nothing.
You are my everything.
You are the face
That I want to see when I wake up.
The voice that I want to hear say,
"Good morning, beautiful."
I listen to everyone's problems,
But yours are the only ones
That don't annoy me
Because they are my problems too
And I guess I just accepted
That I want to be with you
For a long long time
And I love that idea
Of us

I am not diagnosed with anxiety,
But I know it is there.
I do not take pills,
But perhaps I should.
When I sit here with my thoughts
I know I should be doing something.
I cannot disappoint people
I cannot fail.

I diagnose myself with anxiety,
And the anxiety is you.
Instead of pills,
I reach for the bottle of liquor.
When I sit here with my thoughts,
I know I should be doing what you want.
I cannot disappoint you
I cannot fail.

I always loved the rain.
It was dramatic.
It could give you relief on a hot day,
Or flood entire cities.

I'm listening to the rain outside now
And I remember-
How I used to compare my tears to the rain
Alone in my room
So no one could hear
It was a beautiful thing
That I blamed my sadness on
Instead of accepting depression.

I'm listening to the rain outside now
And all I can think-
Is how much I want to kiss you in it-
Like some cheesy romcom.
How nice it is to be held by someone,
Someone who loves you.
I've beaten depression for a while now,
And I have been appreciative of the rain.
But you,
You make me want to go dance in it.
Jump in some puddles.
Because I am very happy

Do you feel what I feel?

When you touch me,
Do you hear my sharp intake of breath
The way I shudder beneath your fingertips

When you're not looking,
Do you feel my eyes on you
The look of adoration and admiration

When you talk to me,
Do you notice how I catch every word
Your conversation never bores me

When you kiss me,
Do you feel me gravitate towards you
As if there was distance between us

When we're together,
Do you know I love you?
I love you.

Do you know what I know?
You’re a wonderful human being
Angry, but with a heart full of love.
Mutual hearts together
Giving and giving
The gift of your love neverending

And who am I?
I’m the lucky girl.

We whispered into the dark
Stories of life
Because we didn't think-
Anyone would hear us.
But somehow our lost voices
Found each other in the darkness,
Embraced.

For once we didn't hear an echo
Of our pasts.

For once,
We could look towards the future.

I found myself
Getting lost in your eyes
The same way
I've looked at the stars
Since I was 7

And every second
Feeling like a million years
Heavy with time
I sink deeper and deeper
While you raise me up

I found myself
In your eyes
Through your darkening gaze
This must be love-
This intoxicating feeling.

The walls have never been taller,
But we are at war
Are you friend or foe?
Are you something more?
I only ask because-

The way your eyes shine
When you talk to me,
Fills me with a happiness I've never felt-
A sense of fullness-
A feast of butterflies.

The goofy smile you make
After you make a dumb joke,
Causes me to smile even harder-
But the laughter truly ensues,
When you laugh at my dumb jokes.

The ruffled hair look you have
When you've been working,
Makes me notice you even more.
A goofy smile on a good-looking guy
Another feast of butterflies.

So, tell me,
Are you friend or foe?
Because these tall walls
Are slowly coming down

I didn't know who I was
Until I was gone.
Wasted.
Intoxicated.
High.
That's when I found myself.
Outside of the realm of worries.
I sat there,
And I contemplated
And I realized,
I was happy
Even through all the sadness.

I like to give people things
I'll buy them food
Or their movie ticket
Or I'll give them a ride somewhere
Free of charge.
I like to give people things
Because I know how the world is
How it takes too much

It took my father
It took my sanity
It took my patience
It took my hope
But it has not taken away my will
I always have a choice

I choose to give.
And I will give until I have nothing left
Because then,
At least it will be my choice.
And I will know that
The world cannot take away
Something I no longer have.

She said,
I want to die
Just let me die.
And I felt her words
Throughout the entirety of my soul
Because I knew
I knew.

We sat there stroking her back
He and I.
As she kept saying
I want to die
I looked up at him
And I saw it in his eyes
And he saw it in mine
Because he knew.
He knew.

Three broken people
Sitting at a party together.
Her sober thoughts coming out
As drunk words.
I heard it in her voice,
He saw it in my eyes,
I saw it in his eyes,
And for one second,
None of us were alone
Together we shared the pain.
Because we knew.
We knew.

She downplays my emotions
I may be sad,
But she's depressed.
I may be stressed,
But she's been running around all day.
I had a long day,
But hers was even longer.

I am unhappy,
But my emotions aren't as important
As hers.

I am an addict
I smoke, I drink, I gorge on food
The things the doctors tell you not to do
I like when my mind floats in nothingness
I am finally myself

How much more
How much more-
Does it take
For me to feel something
In this nothing

Your sorrow is my sorrow
Why is it so difficult to love another?
I've seen more hurt in love than love
A relaxing day-
Turned into world war three
I just want to drink my wine
And maybe live my life
But your problems come first.
And you wonder why,
It is so hard for me
To love another human.

I've seen the pain of love.
I do not want that yet.

They say there's stages of grief
But I don't remember-
Making it through those
When did looking at your picture-
Become unfamiliar?
Who is that man?
What is the sound of his voice?
How much did he love me?
What was he hiding?
I don't remember going through
The stages of grief.
But apparently,
It made me forget you

Maybe coping is overrated.

You grabbed the rule book
And ripped it in half
Then you blamed
The other players of the game
For your own misery

You never did like rules.
You created your own as you went
But when things didn't go your way,
It was the fault of others.
And now you're alone.

Cheaters never win the game.

My heart brought happiness
Back to my life
And my mind
Made it go away

It's 12 am
And you're at my door
My chest says yes,
But my brain says, "no more."
You walk away confused
While I stand in the doorway
With my heart in my throat
And the pain coursing through my veins
I'm thinking, "My God, this is insane"
I whisper, "I'm sorry.
You deserve better than me.
You're too pure for this darkness*"
I hope one day you will see
Why I had to make you leave.

I reached for the bottle of whiskey
Because I didn't want to feel anything.
Then I reached for the bottle of *****
Because I wanted to feel something.
Then I reached for the bottle of wine
Because I wanted to relax in the midst of chaos.
Now I reach for nothing at all
Because I don't know what's real anymore.

I poured my heart out
With a pen and paper
Until there was nothing left
An empty shell holding a journal.

I used to be happy.
I used to know what it was like
To feel joy course through my body.
We all did,
At one time.

Then there's the loss
And none of us are ever the same.
Pretenders, I'd call us.
We can fool the lucky few who don't know the darkness.
The oblivious-
They do not know what the world is.

The world is a beautiful, devastating mess
It takes, but it doesn't give
Mounds of dirt viciously colliding and collapsing
To make canyons and mountains.
And yet, some people only see the beauty
Not the destruction

You cannot see the destruction
Without having been destroyed
And to be destroyed,
Is to be lost forever.

*And we just keep on pretending

There's always that one girl.
So used to dealing with horrors
That she's learned to smile through it
She never cries
She always listens
Everyone thinks she is a great friend
But one day she will die.

She will drown in the tears
Of the people she tried to help

No one will realize,
That the girl who had helped them
Broke piece by piece
Because although she listened to everyone,
No one ever listened
To her silent pleas

Dying was never difficult
Living is what keeps us anxious.
We keep ourselves in chains
Even if we are unaware of this *******.
Fighting wars-
Against societal constructs
When the real battle is within all of us.
We lie to protect
We crave attention,
But our guilty pleasure is our loneliness.
We like to hurt
Because secretly,
We like the way it feels-
When there's nothing but emptiness inside.

We're nothing but dust
We're nothing but a speck
In an expanding universe.
Our lives a tiny blip of history.
Dying is the only way we add to the universe
No one will remember how we lived.
We are humans.
The scariest thing in the world-
Is immortality.

Make the most of your tiny blip.

A hunger for something
Anything
The child turns towards her mother
I'm hungry
A mother walks away from her child
You ate this morning
Because a piece of bread
At 8 am
Was supposed to be a reminder
Of what a great mother she was.
With only a baby doll and a box
The child continues playing
As her stomach slowly eats itself
While the mother goes out
To smoke the grocery money
And cry about her incarcerated love.

And again
We see why our world
Is killing itself.

As Halloween nears,
I think back to that Valentines Day
In February 2011,
My dad died.

As Halloween nears,
I think back to the pain I felt
Losing my father at such a young age,
My coach.

As Halloween nears,
I think back on my family
And how I had to be the strong one,
Still hurts

As Halloween nears,
I think about how much I hate death
How much I hate Valentines Day,
But I'm not alone.

Your father died today.
As Halloween nears for the years to come,
You will understand,
Why I hate Valentines Day so much.

The pain passes from me to you
A loss is not just a loss
It is a decaying of the soul;
It is a hole that will never go away,
A fight that eats away at you.
I never wanted anyone else to feel it.

Physical pain doesn't compare
To the type of pain I am describing.
Blood pouring from a wound
Feels better than losing someone of the same blood;
We now share this pain.

Now, my friend,
Do not cry
Or do cry.
It is okay to mourn in your own right.
He is gone,
And it is okay to feel empty forever.

I understand.

It was her smile
That could light up a room
But a single frown
That could shatter everyone near her
She wore the crown
Encrusted in jewels
And even then
We all shattered more than we shined.
A lonely life on the throne
Catches up
To even the greatest of rulers

It was her illness
But it was everyone else
Who suffered

Sadness was only a muse
And now it has gone away

Anger came in second
And it no longer has use

I'm left without muses
In my new happy, little world

Nothing to write about
No hurt, no pain

I thought I'd be happy
To see happiness again

And that is the conundrum,
My friends.

A poet thrives on it,
The sadness, the anger.

They love writing about the hurt and the pain
What do they do when it has left?

And when I said,
"Beware of those who pretend",
It was a warning,
Because you should never-
Trust someone who tells you that,
Because they know
How to pretend
All too well.

This one's for you.
My free spirit up in the sky,
I know you are watching me.
My toes in the sand
My eyes on the crashing waves
Beer in my hand
As the jazz blares in the background.

So this one's for you
Because I know that if you could be,
You'd be here too.

The light finally glistening
Into her eyes
As she sees the world
For the first time

Many years away
From reality
But today
She is happy.

I lost a part of myself
A long time ago.
But one day,
I woke up
During the middle of spring
And I saw the sun for the first time in a while.
I stopped comparing my tears to the rain.
Instead of the voices inside my head,
All I could hear were the sounds of nature.
I laughed until it no longer sounded foreign.
I did all of these things
Because something inside clicked.
I was happy.

I lost a part of myself
A long time ago.
But,
I think I found it.

The words slipped out of my mouth
Before I had time to think.
I'm sorry for what I said,
I know you're on the brink
Please forgive me.

I've lost that sense of feeling-
Of home.
Was told it was never a place,
But the people.
But something inside me brings me back
To the place that brought me pain and suffering
And it's almost funny
Because under all that pain,
I know I was happy for part of it.
I must leave this place behind for me to move on
It has almost become foreign to me
But I still feel the war when I stay inside
Darkness vs. Light
At least I knew then who I was fighting

Without a home,
What or who am I fighting now?

I'm not going to let this happen.
You will not ruin this day for me.

There are people out there that actually care,
And I don't care if you aren't one of them.
Not anymore.

I wish...
That I could find happiness
That someone will see me for who I am
That you will see what you've lost.
You've lost me.

6 months
It said.
A trial run.
If you don't like it,
You can send it back.

I guess our love was kind of like that.

I heard it today.
Quite shocking,
I must say.
It wasn't forced,
It wasn't fake.
I heard myself laugh
A genuine laugh.
Welcome back.

It only takes a split second
We are not invincible
Fate decides
The turns we take
The bad moments to look at our phones
Fate decides
Whether we see tomorrow's sunrise.
See our family one last time.

A young life taken
A mother is shaken
My eyes have opened
It could have been me
It could have been any of us.
But 18 years young
Lost to the world
Because
Fate decides.

The calendar hasn't changed it's page
In 5 years.
It's hanging on the wall upstairs
Stuck on February 2011
It's too sad to turn the page
Because you were always the one to do it,
Until the day you died
In February 2011.

I am lost,
In this desolate place in time and space
Slowly floating into nonexistence
A life of not doing
But being.
Who knew space was like a maze?
The dead ends replaced with black holes
That **** you up into their worlds.
A world of darkness,
With tiny dashes of light.
***** of gas burning me alive.
A world of suffering,
But a world of beauty.
I don't believe I mind the pain.
Glancing at Earth from billions of light years away
A tiny ant.
We are nothing.
Our lives are only a minuscule fraction of this universe,
So along I go,
I couldn't find my place in my world,
So I floated through space
To find my place in the universe,
But this maze has overcome me
I don't think humans were made
To experience life in the sky.

Maybe I've lost myself
I'm still stuck in your brain
Since the last time you saw me
I need you to give me back

Maybe you've lost yourself
You're still stuck in my brain
Since the last time I saw you
I don't want to give you back

Maybe we've lost each other forever
Left with only a piece of you
And a piece of me
Lost in the darkness of each others hearts
We had tried to enlighten.
The last time we saw each other
Only a glance,
Only a whisper.
*Goodbye

I'm starving
For things I've never had.
I'm starving
For adventure
I'm starving
For love
I'm starving
For new experiences
I'm starving
For my own story

I am weak,
But I am strong.

I am silent,
But I can scream loud.

I am shattered
But I can rebuild

I am beaten
But I can fight back.

I am many things,
But don't underestimate me.