i have always been slightly overweight,
watching the numbers fall and rise,
5 to 50, i've seen it all-
but as long as i'm healthy and happy
with my whole heart i can say,
i don't mind

i don't mind having thighs
that go bump in the night,
i don't mind giving my lover
something to bite,
i don't mind having a body
with valleys and hills,
i don't mind having an ***
that gives men chills,
i don't mind that i'm curvy
and fill out my clothes,
i am woman, i am wonderful,
and i don't care who knows

with stigmas and diets
attacking our sight,
i'll give you a body that's
not under society's plight,
maya taught me well
when she told us all
that women are their own
and women are phenomenal

i'm in love with myself
and i don't care who knows,
i am woman, i am wonderful,
and i don't mind

the comfortable silences linger
and i find nothing unsuitable
about sitting amongst ferns
and breathing in the mountain breeze

i want not for long-winded
words full of nothing but air

we may not always understand
one another, but you have taught
me to value something i had
never even noticed before

how can i ignore eyes opening
and lights being turned on?

i think of myself and i can't
help but thank you,
for now, i am free

why do I still care
that you dated a girl
with my weird,
half-shaved head, haircut?
I still wonder if you
asked her to cut her hair
that way
because you missed
the feeling of fingertips
on fresh buzz

I look back at myself
and I feel shame-
not for the things I’ve done,
or haven’t-
but for not loving myself
deeply and always,
for selling out to insecurities
and letting others tell me
what defined my essence of self,
for not seeing my soul
clearly, and for not
being my own
biggest risk and reward

the only thing you ever
gave me were ****** up
naval cavities and an
inexplicable understanding
of what it means to lay
in someone’s arms
and feel completely alone

I wish that I had written sooner

though I can still feel the warmth of
your smile, see the crows feet by
your eyes, and hear your deep laughter,
all of your tattoos have begun to blur

I remember seeing you and needing to
know you, or maybe it was that I
already did, the universe pulling
me back towards an old friend

you kept me alive with coffee and
grant slams and the reassurance
that I would never be alone in
questioning everything, and even
though you're gone, I'm not alone

I think of the moon and I see you,
I feel us smiling and swaying as
Kerouac took us back in time, to
a place where art was all that
lived and breathed, our bodies
just vessels for the unveiling

you will always remind me
that there is no such thing as
too late, that endings are beginnings
bursting with beauty and
that happiness comes with
full acceptance of self, and
above all else, love

I spend my days
thinking in poetry-
perfection never penned,
perpetually falling upon
my own deaf ears
and disintegrating into
the great nothingness,
only to be recycled
into bits and pieces
of other poems
never to be read

with each night
the words vanish,
one by one,
as I repeat them
incessantly, hoping
that I just might
recite a stanza
upon waking

I wish that my
mouth would open
and out they would
come, perfectly pressed
upon cardstock, fresh
with that inky smell
I swear still lingers
on my finger tips and
pillowcases

instead, I lay still
and silent, and watch
hopelessly as
they drift into dreams

I'm sorry that I can't
find the words to give you
everything that you want,
but that was never the point

with you everything is a point,
drawing blood with each
interaction and there is no
smile nor sadness in your eyes,
just glass

I wonder what you would do
with the words anyways, how
they might possibly undig the
graves that you sleep in when
you've forgotten what night is

I never imagined words meant
much in hell, but we'll say this
together now,

You've always known better than I

sometimes it's all too much beauty -
this slow swing of life, legs dangling,
rainbow kissed fingernails clutching
ropes that are nearly worn thin, lungs
throwing air out in neatly folded piles
of whoops and screeches, which explode
into messes once they've escaped the
long, damp caves through cheshire cat smiles

your head on my shoulder allows me to
spot the tiny surfer riding the corn colored
waves of your hair, and the pulses that make
your sleeping arms dance
comfort me because you are comforted

we spend entire weekends watching
petunias bought with snack money bloom,
and the spiders swarm our honey dipped
deck to show us their latest web innovations,
we smile and stare and see
tomorrow after tomorrow in the sprawling
forests and caribbean beaches in one
another's eyes

if I could breathe you in through one of
these death sticks I would, slow and deep,
and you'd curl up tight in my soul, and I'd
never stop singing Jonny Cash songs
while you drifted off to sleep