What is a heart without a soul,
and an eye without sight?

I am a wanderer through life
the woods a dark path,
and an ocean so wide that if you swim too far,
you’ve passed Go and there’s no money to collect

Hands choke
the only embrace they know
when the only place they’ve known
is the beating clock face
perspiring time
beads of seconds running down the wall

I am an enigma and senseless in my thoughts
Things I know, things that remain unchanged

My eyes are broken
glasses aren’t helpful
seeing as my tear ducts provide as much liquid
as Roman aqueducts

My hair is metamorphosis,
cornsilk in summer,
copper in winter,
which leads to the questioning of a soul
though perception of color
determines nothing in the realm of human life

I am closed doors and low lights,
the bare minimum to read

Intergalactic travel has been made available
with the library as our NASA savior

Food, water, shelter
basic life sources
but I feed off of words

a language leech
a metaphor monger
a wasted writer

I lead through words
actions
lack there of

How can I control 40 kids,
when I haven’t even figured out how to do that with myself?

I am a magnet
my hands gravitate to stray dogs
***** cats
hand sanitizer is a wonderful invention

I am lost in what I am not
the feeling of loneliness certainly possible
even when I must always have someone around

I’ve shed my cocoon
but it’s felt more like a molted snake skin

My wings, promised brilliant and strong,
brown, crinkled paper, illegible

The strength to fly
eludes my desire to leave

What’s life without a paradox,
and a journey with no goal?

I am mapless
a piece of paper even more unreadable to my leaky-faucet eyes
something I find beauty in as wallpaper
but nothing I could use

I am rolling tides
Emotions crash in waves
knocking me into the current
taking me away
with no buoy in sight

unknown,
sad,
frustrated,
alone,
hopeless,
lost,

and, in the rare instances,

content

What’s being without feeling,
and trying without wanting to do?

I am a daughter that has made parents proud,
without making myself feel anything

I am a friend,
one that has been left
returned to
used
and kept
only by few

I am a companion,
my eyes used where his eyes cannot see color
“The sky looks so purple tonight.”
“I don’t know what purple is.”

I am love too powerful to maintain
cloaked in fear, disinterest, anger

I am not what I appear,
my mind thinking it’s a good idea
to display the opposite of what I feel

Freudian defense mechanisms
never gave much protection
offense tangible
tasting distaste
the words can be on the tip of my tongue
and cliff dive head first
into social suicide
Tolkien, Card, Rowling, King, Bradbury,
protectors and hopes

Paper can burn
memories sear
words pain

I am independent,
refusing aid
most cantankerously
when it’s needed most

I am depths
I myself don’t know
a venture that seems too dark to take the plunge
an open pit of life
disguised as littered ground