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 Jun 2014 Vivian
gg
to smile like that,
you ******* Cheshire cat,
your lips curled up
as you lounge in the grass,
your legs sprawled out,
your face painted every
shade of smug
because I want to kiss you
(and you know it)
because I want to **** you
(I hope you know that)
for ruining roundhouses
with weak knees
for turning my right hook
into my right hand on your chest
as you pull me in closer
you turned my (occasional) quick wit
into pure aphasia
brought on by your all-consuming gaze
and I'm left awkward and dumbstruck,
wondering who gave you the right
to look at me like *that
 Jun 2014 Vivian
Josh Bowman
Nomadic
 Jun 2014 Vivian
Josh Bowman
The history books say we outgrew a "phase" of nomads.
We don't move,
or do we?
Do we move in our childhood?
Interrupting friendships and education.
Removed from a house built of brick, mortar, and memories.
Thrown into the populace of new locals.
They're kind, welcoming.
But they're not the people I know.
The school is strange and I have no friends to share my time with.
They say you're supposed to fit in after a couple weeks, right?
Or maybe it's a couple months.
Or years.
Or maybe it's until you become anorexic because you realize there must be something wrong with you, never them.
Always you.
That's when you fit in, right?

They say we're not nomads.
We're done with that phase.
 Jun 2014 Vivian
Josh Bowman
If people were like peaches
the scent of their beauty would slap your face and astound you before you catch sight of them.
The constantly blushing skin breaks when bitten to reveal the sweetness cloaked within.
Some flesh is left around the heart that has been hardened by too many days abandoned in the sun.
The body is consumed ravenously by the eyes and mouth, the most beautiful part of the fruit.
But then the heart appears, the absolute entity of the fruit.
The heart has never been a competitor of beauty for its delicious casing.
And so it is disposed.
Without a backward glance.
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
Baby, I have a hurricane of hair
and a storm behind my eyes
and one hand on my hip,
ready to fight for my beliefs.
But I wouldn't mind
if you'd be my sunshine,
kiss the lids of my eyes,
I'll take my hand off my hip,
put your hands on my thighs,
I'll let the anger slip away, if just for today
so I can recite for you
my prettiest poetry
in between cinnamon kisses
and tell you stories that I heard
in the rustling of trees on a breeze
and maybe it's too much that I want
to know all of your everything,
but I'm imagining moonlit dancing
and lazy days spent listening to music
and walking through new cities, hand in hand.
We could have it all, baby,
let's just give it a chance.
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
Last Summer
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
Last summer was punctuated with your comma smiles,
the words formed from the sounds of lazy afternoons spent with friends -- TV marathons and poolside reading --
that filled the time in between nights parked in the driveway talking
(because goodbye was imminent, but we kept it at bay).
Everything was uncertain and undecided,
but wonderful just the same.
I spent hours afterwards
trying to understand the disparity
between the way you looked at me
(and the way I froze under your gaze)
and the things you said
(or, rather, didn't say).
When your world shattered,
my heart, too, broke along with it
(empathy is a side effect of losing someone you love,
as you now know)
and I tried to pick you back up after you had fallen.
It was a summer of unknowns,
my life just on the perch of a thousand firsts,
and I clung to your familiarity.
The dreamy haze of it all was blown away
when reality came storming in,
but I still find ghosts of it
in this summer's busy days, particles of thatĀ old magic
dotting the nights like fireflies
(and I find myself awake and at the door, late at night, to let in Nostalgia and entertain him).
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
5/22/14
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
I'm still trying to understand the fact that no baby is born hating itself and yet as life goes on people will love you but they might also hurt you or leave you or any number of horrible things, and all you can do is let them leave with pieces of you and try to fill the holes back in with something else or else try to forget that the hole is there (or at least try to forget the person that caused it) and as life goes on all of those holes make us grow in different ways than we were headed (like when people make cuts in trees and manipulate to make them grow knotted together -- people put holes in us and we try to grow around them or away from them) and we just get more and more ****** up each time until there are things we don't like about ourselves and then we expect someone else to love our insecurities when all we do is complain about them and how empty we feel (we're all full of holes) and if someone had just told us to keep loving ourselves from the start and to remember that we're all flawed humans maybe it wouldn't hurt so much when I am lying awake at three in the morning because you didn't text me back when you said you would and I'm starting to see all of the imperfections in my face and my personality and I can't sleep because I'm trying to remember just one reason that I ever thought you could love me.
Sorry, this isn't really a poem, it just kind of started as a thought and then  kept going until I imagined the kind of person who would be thinking about this (if that makes any sense). It's supposed to be a kind of stream of consciousness.
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
If You Love Me
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
lay with me on the lawn
when it's too hot to move
and silently soak up the sunlight

dance with me while moonlit
to your favorite song
as the stars shimmer in our eyes

love every part of me,
speak to me in poetry,
and never let me go
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
5/18/14
 May 2014 Vivian
gg
missing you was once feeling broken
to miss you was to be afraid
to stand helpless as longing punctured my heart,
seeping a poisonous blend of nostalgia,
guilt, and anger around my lungs
to wait as the ache spread throughout my body bringing
days of discomfort and confusion
a kind of heavy weight that makes smiles impossible
the kind that makes an empty bridge look like open arms
I could sit and miss you until it drove me mad,
until I had lost myself in a cycle
of love, guilt, and hate
my body paralyzed while my mind battled for clarity
to miss you was to cause myself unbearable pain
and yet I couldn't stop as it flowed through my veins,
a drug I couldn't refuse
missing you was was a tornado tearing walls down
until I was left on an empty foundation,
shuddering, breathless, and windswept

but missing you now is like living someplace new,
everything is different but the world isn't ending
where there once were threatening storms,
all that's left is a breath of relief,
an absence of pain that leaves me floating
I remember you like summers past,
Missing you is like flipping through photographs,
I remember you and smile
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