(tw; abandonment)

How long has it been?

So long that the number escapes me,
long enough that I've forgotten the last time I saw you,
face to face, spoke to you,
long enough that sometimes,
I forget what you look like,
how your voice sounds.

Have you changed since we last spoke?

It's not often, but on occasion,
you slip into my subconscious,
and I remember you vividly,
like it was just yesterday that I saw you,
when in reality, it's been... years.
Once, I dreamed that you hugged me.
I miss that feeling,
I miss the enveloping warmth,
the feeling of love I used to get when I was around you.

Do you dream about me?

I graduated from high school this summer.
I never thought I would,
or that I even could, but I did.
You weren't there.
I looked out into the crowd of people,
of families.
I saw mine.
But the one person I was hopeful to see wasn't there.

When did you lose interest in me?

I still have your letters.
I avoid reading them,
but I remember the promises you made in them,
the assurance that you would change,
you would be a better you and love me like I deserved.
I found it hard to write back.
I didn't know what to say.
I was young, immature.
I had the words in my head,
but putting them on paper,
that was a whole other mountain to climb,
and even for one so young,
my arms were weak
from the mountains I had already scaled,
hands calloused,
damaged from the harsh edges of the life I lived.
It was too daunting.
But, still, I hoped you would stay true to your word.

Why did you lie to me?

All this time I've spent alone,
trying to fill the void you left behind,
with anything and anyone I had access to,
and I always end up more broken than I started.
It's hard to believe that anyone will ever love me
because you didn't.

Am I unworthy of your love?

There's so much I've wanted to say to you,
and even when I try to reach out,
you have nothing to say in reply
so much will be left unresolved,
because there's a good chance we will never speak again,
that one of us will die before we can sit down and talk,
like we haven't done in so long,
but if there was one last question I could ask you,
it would be...

Do you miss me, father?

(tw; existentialism)

I am intimidated by you,
though perhaps it is not you that I am intimidated by,
but simply that time seems to fly
faster than I am capable of falling in stride.
The universe is infinite
but my existence is the opposite,
limited,
and I am terrified to die.

(tw; abandonment)

I don't belong.

First thought:
This is sweeping generalization,
an overdramatization of the truth,
the truth that everyone belongs somewhere .
Everyone has a place, a purpose,
a reason for being here, and if you were put
on this godforsaken Earth in the first place,
you belong somewhere.

Second thought:
What even does belonging mean?
It's just a word, belonging,
a word we assign meaning to,
a word that really means nothing.

Third thought:
Here we go again.
Millennials and their **** whining,
always whining about nothing.
attention-seeking, that's what this is,
just attention-seeking, nothing more.
If you want a place to belong,
you can **** well find it on your own.
Take some **** initiative.

Fourth thought:
You're overreacting.
You're reading into things,
seeing things that aren't there
No one dislikes you, you're fine,
if they didn't want you around,
they wouldn't have invited you.

Fifth thought:
Oh god.
They hate me.
Oh god.
Just keep making weird noises,
keep getting them to laugh.
If they laugh, it's fine.
Everything's fine.

Dear Newborn,

Hi, hello.
Welcome.

I hope you’re enjoying your stay here on planet Earth.

I’m sure the drive in was a little difficult, a little painful,
perhaps a little ****** (or a lot ******),
like moving from the darkest cavern to the brightest….
well, place. Area. Location.

I can’t think of anything superbly bright right now.
Oh, oh, I know.

It’s like living your whole life floating
at the far reaches of outer space and then
catapulting directly into the sun.

Great analogy.

Regardless, welcome.

I said I hope you enjoy your stay,
the key word being hope, because, well,
you may not enjoy it.

In fact, it’s guaranteed that there are parts of life
that will be near-torturous,
that will make you wish you had never been brought
into this world.

But with that also comes moments of happiness
unlike anything you will ever experience, 
intense joy that makes you feel as though
you’re weightless once again,
floating out in space with no restraints,
no boundaries, just peace.

The good will be great,
and the bad will be horrible,
and sometimes the good will be good
and the bad will be just bad,
it all depends on the day.

A word of advice: treasure the time you have.

You won’t understand why this is important until you're older,
but do it anyway.

Life fades just as quickly as it is brought to fruition,
and there are people on this Earth you will want to treasure
like they are the finest gold ever to be panned out of any river.

There will be moments like this, too,
moments you wish would never fade,
and they will fade,
but never let them escape your memory,
and seek to make more of those moments every day,
even when happiness seems like an impossible dream.

Life is the most difficult journey you will ever go on,
but has the possibility of being the most rewarding, as well.

Allow the pain to be felt just as vibrantly as the happiness.

Never stifle your emotions.
Never limit others.
Never forget where you came from.
Never stop dreaming,
But never allow yourself to be tied down by those dreams, either.

Be free,
do what makes you happy,
be compassionate,
travel,
drink and make merry
(once you're legally allowed to, mind you),
and just be.

Exist to the great capacity you possibly can,
and die knowing you lived

Wishing you the greatest of luck,
A young dreamer

(tw; family dysfunction)

That's the word you use, isn't it? 
"Did you remember to call the vet?"
"Oh, no, my bad, I was a little preoccupied."
"What about the trash company? We haven't gotten our bins yet."
"Shoot, I completely forgot."
"We still have to get our internet set up, remember?"
"I did say I was going to do that, didn't I?"

Yes, you did.

You did say that.

And every day,
I have to remind you again,
like a parent pestering their child
about cleaning that pigsty of a room,
and every day,
that growing pile of promises remains untouched,
unfulfilled, and increasingly funny-smelling.

Being preoccupied has practically become your job,
so it's no wonder that absentmindedness is sometimes known
as preoccupation.

All jokes aside, there is a fine line between forgetfulness
and prioritization of him over us,
a line you've made a point of crossing
at every opportunity that has arisen.

But maybe I'm unfairly assigning blame. 

Maybe we're both at fault. 

Because, you see, I lied. 

Those words never left your lips, but even fabricated excuses,
however exasperating they would have been to truly hear,
are still better than the reality.

With each reminder, I was met with an ever-so-slight
narrowing of the eyes that so closely resemble my own,
a sigh of "yes, I know,"
and even more empty promises. 

And yet, I continue to persist. 

Why? Because it's important to me. To us. 

I'm beginning to wonder if it's worth it,
waiting for something that will never come.

Maybe I'm overreacting. 

Now that I think about it, it does seem trivial,
insignificant in the grand scheme of things,
but it's those little trivialities that
you were supposed to be responsible for.
​​​​​
You preach to me about the importance of family,
and admonish me when I take that family for granted,
and yet you disregard your own,
not even bothering to ask us how we feel
about this unfamiliar, near-constant presence in our home.

He can never fill in what is missing,
can never make up for what has been absent for years,
but I may have grown to like him, had he not be forced upon me.

I have been given no choice but to interact, to tolerate. 

I have no say whatsoever because my voice has been stifled
by your unwillingness to listen,
your apathy regarding what I may have to say.

Maybe you're afraid. 

Afraid of what we think of him. 

Afraid of disappointment. 

But the more distance you put between yourself and us,
the more time of ours you take and fill with him,
the clearer your message becomes.

We don't matter. 

We aren't important enough.

Our thoughts, our feelings,
they are absolutely and unequivocally irrelevant.

You don't care. 

How did this happen? 
Was it him? Did he do this? Or was it something else?

Did we do something? Did I do something?

There has to be a reason, a rational explanation.
Of course there is, why wouldn't there be?

There's a valid reason, isn't there? 

​​​​​​I can fix this.
Tell me how to fix this.
There has to be a way to fix it.  

What did I do wrong? 

Sorry, did you say something? I was preoccupied.

(tw; family dysfunction)

I don't remember the day we first met.
I don't remember the time or the place
or what you were wearing
or what the very first thing you said to me was.

Honestly, it's difficult to imagine you
speaking to me at all, because, well,
that would require me not giving off an aura of distaste
to everyone in my general vicinity,
due to my extreme distrust of people in general.

Knowing me, we probably didn't even speak
until I grew used to seeing your face day after day,
became accustomed to your presence.

It's likely I knew your name before I said a word to you,
as I am an introvert with a side of social anxiety,
and it's always been a bit difficult for me to make friends.

Even after the first words we exchanged
transformed into our first conversation,
as pitiful of an excuse for one as it may have been,
there was nothing spectacularly romantic about it.

It was just passing remarks littered with wit,
sarcasm, and largely inappropriate humor.

 I don't remember when you became so important to me.

No matter how much I wrack my brain,
clawing meticulously through every memory I can reach
in my largely disorganized mind,
it's impossible for me to pinpoint that one moment,
the instant in time that changed everything.

What I do remember is the way every inch of your face
reddens when you laugh,
that contagious grin spreading across your cheeks
as if you had just heard the funniest thing in the world.

I remember how it feels when I'm the one causing that smile,
that rush of accomplishment I get when I can make you happy,
even for just a moment.

Those little things, however insignificant they may seem,
are stuck with me,
ingrained into my brain like the stain of spilled grape juice
on a once-pure white shirt,
imprinted into my soul like an unexpected fissure in a landscape.

They torture me, day and night,
and you would expect by the way I describe these feelings
that I want them to go away,
that I want to remove the stain you've made on my life,
stitch my landscape back together
and act as though you hadn’t cracked me open,
and maybe, once upon a time, I would have,
but now?
I never want them to go away.

As much as it pains me to feel this way,
and as much as I sometimes despise being so attached to you,
undeniably and irrevocably reliant on your existence in my world,
you've made me feel ways that, a few years ago,
I didn’t think were possible.

Not long ago, I wasn't even sure if being happy with myself
was possible,
much less feeling anything close to whatever this may be,
because I haven't quite figured it out yet.

All I know is that I care about you,
no matter how much or how little that may mean.
I care in ways that I probably shouldn't.

I want to protect you, keep you safe from harm,
and when I can't, it hurts.

It physically hurts me to see you endure any kind of suffering,
and yet I know you have to, every single day,
because you've told me so.

I've sewn together the shreds of you,
the real you, that you've shown me,
and as short and fleeting as those glimpses may have been,
I only want to see more.

I want to know who you really are, behind the mask,
behind the walls of the impenetrable stone fortress
that you've built for yourself.

You like caging your heart in your chest to protect it from harm,
I know that all too well,
but I want to put the pieces of you back together,
and even if I can't,
I will hold the shards of your soul with my bare hands
and keep you close to me.

No matter how long it takes,
no matter how painful it is,
no matter how much I bleed,
I'll do it for you.

 Most people sweep broken things into a dustpan
and toss them in a trash bag,
tying them up and leaving them on the side of the road
with all of the other discarded and damaged items
that once had a purpose,
but I'm not one of those people.

I keep every broken thing I've ever come across,
if I can hold on long enough,
whether it be pieces of someone else or pieces of myself.

With you, though, I think it's both.

You remind me of the way I used to be,
and the way I am now.

Maybe that's why I care so much.
Because I know what it's like to have a mask.

I understand how it feels to have to protect yourself
from your own family,
because even they find ways to hurt you,
even when they try not to,
even when they don't.

You know that, though, or at least,
you may have come to that conclusion,
because I've offered shreds of myself to you, too,
the suffering I've had to endure.

You know, but I want you to understand why,
why I've allowed you to see the pieces of me that
I rarely show anyone.

Because I understand what it's like, and at the end of the day,
we're not that different.

After all, we’re both in pieces.

We’ve lost so much of ourselves,
and even though we’ve tried to keep the fragments together,
losing them was inevitable for us.

There’s not enough left to restore us completely.

We would have to search to the ends of the Earth
to even come close to making ourselves whole again,
and even then, it wouldn’t be enough.

But maybe we don’t have to.

Maybe we only need to look right in front of us,
because together,
we have enough to make something extraordinary.

(tw; family dysfunction)

Who am I?

I like to think that, in every punch,
Every curse,
Every outburst of rage,
There is a little bit of my father.

In every burst of anxiety,
Every obsessive drive for perfection,
Every rejection of genuine emotion,
There is a little bit of my mother.

In every spiteful comment,
In every grudge held too long,
In every egotistical  thought,
There is a little bit of my stepfather.

And even if we are not together,
Fated from the beginning to tear one another to pieces,
We are still one big ******* happy family.

(tw; hypothermia, death)

Having depression is like being caught out in a blizzard.

At first, the cold seems like nothing.

You're all bundled up in a fluffy coat,
scarf wrapped around your face,
hands slipped into gloves and tucked under your arms.

But then the snow begins to fall,
and the temperature drops,
and it's like the chill is stripping you down, layer by layer,
even though all your layers are still there.

It gets colder, and you start to feel the effects of the chill,
the fierce winter seeping into your bones,
making it seem as though you only walked outside
in a pair of shorts and a tee-shirt.

Your body begins to numb as the cold starts,
the weakest parts of you losing their feeling first.

Your nose,
your ears,
your cheeks and your face and your fingers,
all becoming completely numb,
as if they aren't there anymore.

And then your legs stiffen up,
and you have trouble walking,
even though you try so hard to keep moving,
because you know if you stop, you're doomed.

But you lose your ability to function,
the cold causing almost complete ****** paralysis,
and no matter how hard you try,
it's impossible to keep moving.

You fall to the ground,
curling into a ball in the snow,
trying to keep yourself warm,
but the cold is too much.

And as the hypothermia sets in,
your brain tricks you into thinking you're actually warm,
and you strip off the layers that were the only thing
keeping you alive.

And then it's over.

(tw; abandonment)

A feeling I never thought I'd feel,
but here I am, writing a poem about you

Do you think about me, too?

You're always on my mind,
even more than the ticking of the clock is
because you know I'm always really excited to get home
so I can talk to you without glancing up every second
to see if the teacher's looking

But at the same time,
thinking about you makes me think about
how scared I am of losing you

My number one fear has always been losing people,
and it's happened so many times, over and over again

It's a vicious cycle and losing you might just do me in.

I can't breathe without you,
but even when I'm with you,
my breathing is labored

Because how do I stay calm
when I'm hanging off of the edge of this cliff you dangled me over
(unintentionally, of course)

My heart is pounding in my chest,
no peace, no rest,
and as much as I love you,
the fear of losing you is something I'll never be able to overcome

The fear of dropping to my doom is something
I will never be able to forget

As much as you comfort me in my time of need,
that fear always sneaks back

Hiding under my bed like the boogeyman,
and I start to wonder, 'is it worth it?'

Yes. Yes, it is.

It will always be worth it.

Because the fear I feel of losing you is much less damaging
then the suffering I feel without you

Poets, the disciples of the modern world.

Followers of the great Almighty Lord of
alliteration and symbolism.

Their eccentric natures make them the pariahs of this world.

We cannot wrap our minds around
the words they artfully speak,
so we refuse to accept them.

Their eyes burn like fire in their skulls
as they stare you down from a podium.
In their hands, they hold their own hearts
which they have ripped out of their chests,
holding them out as if asking for you to accept it from them, wanting you to understand what every beat means.

Poets are misunderstood beings,
tortured creatures,
but they are far stronger than any others,
because they have the gall to speak their minds unforgivingly,
bare their most inner secrets and struggles
to an audience of strangers.

They are quick of tongue,
speaking faster than one's ear can hear,
but somehow they still manage to work themselves into your head with every word.

They're parasites,
infecting your mind and soul,
tugging at you and driving themselves into your brain
until their poems are all you think of.

But they are not evil parasites.

They hurt us and make us feel to save us.