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ORLA Dec 2012
I wrote you love letters out of the syrupy innocence of my childish heart,
Mawkish hopes for a future of sweaty handholding and feather-lipped kisses.
More mother than lover, I lived to shield you from the bigger laughing kids,
Because I thought that love was one short ride on the pegs of your homemade bike,
And one dance under purple glowsticks hanging from the cheap drop ceiling,
And, in the stairwell that smelled like paint and old socks, I told you so.
Turned out I wasted my one second wish on the bunny in the moon:
You woke me up with the hollow chill of sudden mere acquaintanceship,
And now you're chasing some blond girl while I'm standing in a corner, busy growing up.
To somebody that I used to know . . .
ORLA Dec 2012
. . . a glass of cold milk after eating a warm chocolate chip cookie
. . . a long hot shower after an hour long run around the indoor track
. . . a piece of blank paper after buying new ballpoint pen
. . . cracking open the thick, juicy sequel to my favorite novel
. . . a cup of black coffee after a long night and a late morning
. . . a stretch after two hours of bending over a computer screen
. . . a catnap between classes after an allnighter spent cramming
. . . a jumbo bucket of movie theater popcorn with extra butter
. . . my warm fur-lined coat when it's below thirty and snowing
. . . Christmas presents wrapped in shiny paper and foamy ribbons
. . . a good grade on the research paper I spent a week writing
. . . just one more potato chip
. . . fame and fortune
. . . she does
ORLA Dec 2012
hello,
it's been really long.
i hope you remember me.
i miss you a lot.
i think about you all the time.
i stayed on the shelf where you put me,
to make sure that you could find me again
if you ever wanted to look.
it's dusty up here, and dark -
i don't think you remember
but i've always been scared of the dark -
and the others are all slowly dying.
i hear them at night,
falling over,
as their button eyes stop shining,
and they stare deadly at me
through the blackness.
they still look sad.
i guess that's what happens when
toys get forgotten.
it's kind of cold up here, too,
but i can remember
your warm, soft bed
that always smelled like sweat
and soap
and the lavendar oatmeal shampoo
that mommy always put in your hair.
i think i might be dying too.
i haven't been feeling well.
have i been forgotten?
have you forgotten me?
i don't blame you,
every child must grow up
and leave.
but i was wondering something -
if it's not too much to ask,
do you think that maybe
you could come find me
take me off the shelf
and bring me to bed with you
just one more time?
use me as a pillow
and wrap me in your arms
and let me be scared of the dark
with you
one last time . . .
Go find your favorite childhood stuffed animal and give it a hug - it misses you.
ORLA Nov 2012
My dearest friend, what have you done tonight?
I fear you may have ****** up once again.
You only had one chance to get it right,
And now I think you might have lost a friend.
You ran away as soon as she declined . . .
Affections are a ***** if not returned,
And many who assert themselves will find
The hearts they wear upon their sleeves are spurned.
But don't give up completely. There's a reason
This love-will-find-a-way **** is so toted.
Some day, somehow, within the perfect season
You will find Her. And I'd like it noted
                That though you walked into a trial today,
                It was a stronger man that walked away.
For a friend.
My second sonnet ever. Feel free to judge.
ORLA Nov 2012
Writer, Writer, finding stories
in every twitch of every eye ---
there are no chance encounters here!
Coincidence is banned from us,
for it does not make good books.

Cause-and-effect makes the world go round,
thus questions by millions unanswered:
why thatword, why that look,
and what crucial subtext
was inferred by that three-second pause?

Does the world work like this,
like a well-crafted novel?
Are we characters moving
to preprescribed endings?

In short, I suppose, my question is this:
            are we Writers so cursed to live in this illusion,
            or cursed to see how the world actually works?
Something I've been struggling with lately.
ORLA Nov 2012
He always sits alone at lunch,
The Roundheaded Kid.
(That's what they call him.)

He never talks to me,
But I wouldn't mind if he tried sometime.
I think I like him,
But I'd never tell him so.

Yesterday he looked at me,
Sitting by myself on this bench,
Eating peanut butter and feeling lonely
Especially when it stuck to the roof of my mouth . . .

I thought I saw something
Sparkle in his eyes.
(The Roundheaded Kid has nice eyes.)

But he saw me looking back,
And put his lunch bag over his head.
Dedicated to Charlie Brown
ORLA Nov 2012
Do you have to be less than whole
To be wholly in love?
All this talk about completion -
"You make me complete" -
Sickens me to no end.
"If you left, I would be nothing."
And you wonder why they leave?

I would be just as complete
With as without you.
You don't make me,
And I wouldn't want to have to
Make you.
You are whole and perfect,
As I am whole and perfect,
And together we will
Overwhelm the world
With our perfect wholeness
Squared.
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