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 Jan 2014 Sarah
Rae La
Pretty Girl
 Jan 2014 Sarah
Rae La
Pretty girl hanging from the ceiling, tell me your story.
Was Mommy an addict and did Daddy like to smack you?
Did Daddy skip town and did Mommy bring all of her boyfriends around?
Did Mommy or Daddy have a special game they liked to play?

Pretty girl dangling, please, tell me your name.
Tell me about how vile you think you are, how it's your fault they took it so far.
Tell me about the fake smile you wore daily.
Tell me about the one best friend you had, the one who knew everything.
Tell me about the neighbor boy you secretly loved, but were too scared to tell him.
Tell me this rope around your neck was an accident.

Pretty girl dead, I will whisper sweet things to you.
I will remember your story and your name.
I will remember your best friend, and I'll tell the neighbor boy how much you loved him.
I will hold you close to my heart, for you were brave.
Yet you weren't strong enough.

Pretty girl, rest in peace.
 Dec 2013 Sarah
Sebastian
Words
 Dec 2013 Sarah
Sebastian
It seems as though
I always want to talk to you
But our conversation comes at a cost
Because every word spoken
Puts me one word closer
To the last words I'll ever say to you.

With hope I could forever speak
With reason and love aimed at your heart
Taking your ears and making them listen
To what I need you to hear
Before you cannot hear anymore.

Carefully I select the sounds I speak
As not to choose the wrong ones
Picking silently in my head
The memories I would like to leave behind
In every moment I spend with you.

I know the last words I will say to you.
They are in my head now
Dancing on my lips
Teasing your ears
But I will not say them.
Not now.
Instead,
I will say them when it is time
For them to be true.

I do hope, however, that when that time comes
You will have already said them
To me.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
©Sebastian @http://hellopoetry.com/sebastian/
 Dec 2013 Sarah
Jessica Stehouwer
I was a phony,
a fake.
A wasted excuse for life.
I would look into the mirror and see nothing in my eyes.
I was another artifact that this selfish world has created.
I was blending into the world around me,
you don't even notice that i'm standing here,
right in front of you.
But I don't want to be like that.
I want to be a vibrant red in a sea of grays
I want to be something beautiful,
something pleasing to look at.
I want to flourish into a beautiful rose.
I want to be like a new rainfall after a lifetime of droughts.
I want to be inspiring and beautiful
I want to be hope for the hopeless.
But since i'm not,
how can I get there?
How can I stand out?
How can I make a difference?
Am I able to do it?
Do I just not see all the possibilities to change?
Maybe i'm just afraid of change...
 Dec 2013 Sarah
Selena Irulan
If you were a puzzle,
I'd take you apart
and carefully analyze each piece.
It'd be a challenge to learn every part,
how they fit in together, and why,
a fun little game of you.
I'd begin to know the real you.
The mystery part in which i had no clue
Everything you hide, i'd find
But while I was playing this game,
forgive me if I maybe-
just maybe-
slip a piece into my pocket
(it was an accident I swear),
so that whenever you're being put back together,
you wouldn't be whole without me.
 Dec 2013 Sarah
E
oceans
 Dec 2013 Sarah
E
Sometimes it’s hard to breathe.
Sometimes the world closes in on your lungs like the
mountains need your breath and the ocean wants your soul.
Moonbeams of indefinite prosperity gleam down upon your skin like
a bridge made of children’s dreams.
They dance along your goosebumps, trying to calm your racing heart.
You cannot see,
you cannot hear.
All you know is the deceptively comforting pale, white walls of your world,
but you do not live in a world,
you live in a cage.
You have never closed your eyes and let yourself be
guided by the wind,
an everlasting pool of transparent anger trying to rule the world,
but never getting farther than vice president.
You will never know the deep blue waves crashing methodically onto the shore,
howling and groaning their way through a job that they will never finish.

Oceans can be selfish, you know.
They own 70% of the world and they’re still not satisfied.
Their deep blue rivers of fear snake their way under our skin and into our veins,
never content until we define ourselves by anxiety and pain.
Cages may hide us from the waves, but they also shield us from our own hidden hearts,
wallowing in the loneliness of pale, white walls with a transparent roof that yields
only to prosperity that is no longer indefinite.
 Dec 2013 Sarah
F Alexis
The Wicked
 Dec 2013 Sarah
F Alexis
Isn't it ironic, lovely ones,
How so many pretty faces
Can hide a demon's soul?

How the same eyes which bat their lashes
In flirty beckoning,
Offer a window into wickedness,
An entrance to an evil place,
That harbors evil things....

How the same lips which speak such pretty words,
And lovely falsities,
In pleasant company
Drip poison behind the safety of closed doors,
Without the courage to speak so
In the outer realm...

How the same mind which seems so wise
Can foster such horrid operations,
An assembly line of treachery
Which twists and warps that
Which really is
Into what is isn't,
For its own selfish, devilish purposes...

Isn't it odd how the world's
Cruel jokes
Have remained so timeless,
Doomed, like history,
To be repeated,
Over and over again?

"Do not judge a book by its cover," they say.

And isn't it funny how this phrase
Aims to promise some unknown good
Behind that cover,
But never entertains the possibility
Of evil behind it,
Instead?

Yet it still holds true.

It is far more dangerous
To trust a pretty face not supported
By pretty words and actions,
To have faith in a glittery exterior
Without pondering the worms
Which breed underneath,
Than it is to doubt
A far less attractive cover,
Beaten, threadbare, its title worn off
By the winds of the world,
May guard a mine of diamonds within.

How foolish of us all
To take at face value
That which we see, hear, and touch.

How irresponsible
To abandon the idea and support of proof,
And let our judgment laze around,
About as useful as if it we hadn't had it at all.

I find it hard to pity those moths
Which do not examine the light
Before letting themselves fly into it.
When the static crackles,
And the glimmer flickers,
And the wings are burnt and injured,
It is too late for a second thought, then.

And as a bystander,
I cannot reach out and pull them from it.
I can call out my warnings,
My cautionary tales,
And even my proof that the light,
In all its beauty,
Harbors a special kind of evil
That they clearly cannot see,
But I must let them learn.

As much as it hurts.


I truly believe that what we put out
Into the world
Will come back to us.
Perhaps not today,
Or tomorrow,
Or anywhere
In the forseeable future ahead.
But it will return.

And though my human nature
Demands I bring order to the wicked,
Expose their evils for the world
To shudder at,
And cower away from,
It is not my job.

These forces which surround us
Bear that burden.

I, a small and staggering presence
Among billions,
Can only perform what I know it right,
And good,
And kind,
And hope that my fellow man,
Instead of drooling at the sight
Of fool's gold,
Will find a true beauty in this instead,
And choose to abandon all that deceives.


On a day which has no date,
No time,
No existence until it is ready,
Justice will come to the evil ones,
And those foolish enough to follow them.

How gloriously the wicked will fall,
Their cries ringing in ears
Which heard their sneers and cruel remarks,
Underhanded jabs and petty,
Childish words,
So many times.

Ears which will hear the music
Of that which was sown,
Being reaped
In the rays of a glorious sun.

Those untrained minds,
Which sought the disappointments
Of easy friendships
And sparkling facades,
Will fall, as well,
Regretting their decision to
Believe in the unreal,
And abandon their sense.

And I, at the end of it all,
May stand with fewer than I started with.

But, with those solid few,
Apart from the unstable masses,
I will still stand stronger
And better than I was,
And with minds like mine,
Rooted in goodness, kindness,
And grateful for the difficult journey
Which brought forth the lesson that
Examining a person's cover
Is well worth discovering what lies beneath.

Beware.
 Nov 2013 Sarah
T
Untitled
 Nov 2013 Sarah
T
I would love to say that I am a happy teenage girl
and that I've never drank
and that I've never done drugs
and that I have impeccable grades
and that I have a great relationship with my parents
and that I love my friends
and that I love to see the sun come up
and that I've never hurt myself
and that I've never smoked a cigarette
and that I've never been with boys much older than me.
But I would really love if someone asked me, really asked me, what was wrong.
 Nov 2013 Sarah
robin
when i bought you a gift,
i didn't really think about it.
wrapped it in your favorite color and
marked it with your name and
realized
i don't know where you live.
its been three years since i last saw you,
a year since we last talked,
and all my new friends just remind me of you.
i almost called her your name the other day.
you acted like i was special, and i
pretended i didn't need you.
christ.
christ.
you promised that nothing would change.
you swore you would visit
(but then every time it seemed you would,
i found myself hoping
you wouldn't. i guess
it's lucky you never did)

sometimes i go a month without thinking of you (forgetting like i should)
and wake from a dream where we're
sitting on the edge of a wall,
three years younger than we are,
throwing rocks down steep slopes,
talking about
reflections on car doors,
melting in california sun.
i straightened you out
when boys left you tangled.
(i've never been in love)
you listened when i talked about
black cats and spirographs
and the way that we can never really touch anything
(i don't think you understood
even half of what i said but
you listened like i was spurting secrets of the universe in waves like
pay attention,
this one will be on the final)

you laid with me on hot sidewalks and then,
you left.
christ.
i thought i was always supposed to be the one who went south,
left someone behind,
wondering about me,
but here we are and still, still, even now
everyone i care about is just like you.
i went north but still even now,
i walk barefoot like the ground is hot and dry,
like it was back home,
like it's not wet from last night's rain.
i think you'd like it here, you liked fog better than i did,
you liked rain, you thought it was
poetic,
you thought colors looked better in the cold.
you liked the way your hair looked wet but hated the way your makeup would run.
you tried to grow closer but instead i would talk
about things that don't matter,
and honestly,
you shouldn't have expected any better from me.
didn't realize till you left that codependence
isn't something i
can avoid, i can only prevent you
from becoming as attached
as me.
can red threads work for friendships too?
sometimes i feel like it wrapped around my torso a thousand times over,
pinching the skin,
and only draped over your hand.
sometimes i feel like a dog with her leash tied to a pole.
i thought i was the one who was supposed to leave,
but christ,
i've always been bound by the border, i've
never been as transient as
i seemed.
that never stopped you.
nothing stops you.
(do i ever come to mind?
do you mention me to your new friends, am i
in any of the stories you tell them?
i don't tell my friends about you.
i'd just be ashamed
of still keeping your laugh in my mind.
i'd just be  jealous
that they know how to say your name)

i remember sitting with you on a wall,
watching heat mirages,
listening to the way you talk
and thinking of telling you things like
the way my parents don't kiss anymore,
the time my mom left in the middle of the night,
and i waited on the stairs under stars for three hours
while my dad told me to come inside,
and orion sat above,
and the driveway stayed empty,
and you turned to me and i made a joke about
nihilism.
you were so honest with me.
(i was honest too,
it's not lying
if you make jokes about how you really feel
it's not lying, it's just a comedy routine)

i think i'm a few years older than i'm supposed to be.
i should be able to move on from a  friend
that left me behind,
i think my mind
is a few years behind my body,
maybe when you left
you borrowed a few of my years for the road,
and now i'm a child in body that's been rotting for 18 years,
crying over a friend that has
better things to do.
laughing over injuries to seem strong.
your gift is still on my desk, and it's been
55 days;
almost two months.
i guess i'll leave this one in my closet too.

happy birthday.
thinking of you.
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