If you gotta dream, show me
Reveal it to the world
And own it
If you gotta passion,
Disown your inaction
And make a habit of climbing the steep hill of your goals,
Or else dissatisfaction will echo in your soul

Go after your dreams fearlessly,
You've got all the potential you need,
Just find the why for the motivation you lack,
Conjure the reasons why you've laid low and cut yourself slack,
Well, you can't hide behind excuses no more,
Because you're a dazzling star and you're too bright to hide behind confining bars

You think you're a nobody?
Too scared to show your true colors?
Hey, you better get out there on that red carpet and like a peacock flaunt all your magnificent beauty,
And not even for a moment doubt yourself
Or listen to the chickens cluck **** about you on the sidelines
You've got a dream
Stop hiding it under your bed
And make it into your reality
You ain't think life got magic,
But it's full of meaning
Once you awaken from your brain dead anxiety
Because you worry too much of what people think of you
Your heart will come alive, beating with all the colors of the rainbow and the music you love will revive you,
I speak from experience,
Stop letting your fears hold you back,
Because they are just lies
No one is gonna believe in your dream as much as you do,
Not until you accomplish what you dream of, when you get there then they'll believe you
What else have you got to live for
But your dream!
It's your purpose
And it's your responsibility
To make your dream a reality
Not until then will you be able to see
The magic that both surrounds us and lives inside of you and me.

A dream dreamt for a millennium
Everyday oozing away as I badgered and prayed
For one splendiferous day
To feel limitless and ecstatic in my cranium.

Suddenly, my dream came to fruition
All this time was worth the anticipation
My brittle bones became strong through elation
My every cell frenetic with love's constitution.

The dream fulfilled
Vanished without warning
Soaking my heart in distrust and mourning
Creating in the center of my mind an emptiness so still.

If I were a boy
I would have so much less fear
I wouldn't always have to look behind my back
And be wary of who I choose to keep near
I wouldn't have to be scared about being assertive
When the guy who's flirting with me makes me disconcerted

If I were a boy
I could go out for a jog
And run in a remote area
I could go hiking and camping all alone
And not have to worry
About being ***** and murdered

If I were a boy
I wouldn't have to question what clothes I wear
Hiding myself under layers,
Because I'm scared
That I'll be abused and ravaged
If I'm attrative

If I were a boy
Reading the news about
The **** and ****** of women
Might not affect me as much as it does
It wouldn't make me reconsider
If I should go outside today,
Ride my bike alone today
Make sure the door is locked and the alarm is set
So hopefully I can get my rest
Without fearing for my life

If I were a boy
Maybe I wouldn't imagine
What it's like to be a woman
Going about her life,
Suddenly attacked by a stranger,
Struggling for her dignity and then her life
Dying under the crushing force of hatred in her killer's eyes

If I were a boy
I wouldn't understand the reasons why a woman would be scared to be a woman.

Celebrating an identity in a gender
Oh! The lipstick,
Oh! The spanx
To God I give thanks!

Being female,
What a blessing,
Even though, I've got to tell you,
These gender roles can be depressing

Nothing like dressing up for a date,
Don't forget, you must be royally late!
Pile on the mascara, concealer and lipstick
Hey mama, don't forget to pull down your dress a bit
You almost forgot to reveal your cleavage!

Please, by all means, empty that pretty little head of yours
Of any intelligence or reason
Girl, your only purpose is for a man's pleasing!
Now, get to that appeasing
You shouldn't be wasting all your time teasing.

Oh, mama, cry it out
Weep and pout
Gossip with your girls
Reject that pretty girl...
Who does she think she is, being naturally beautiful?
She doesn't deserve friends
If she needs support, she has an abundance of men who can pretend.

Go ahead now, pull up that mini skirt more
What do you think he's looking for?
Do you think he cares about your brain?
You're insane!
Do you think he treasures your heart?
Oh please, don't fall apart.
Do you think he'll still love you when you're old?
What, do you think men fall in love with your soul?

In celebration of being female
Let me spare you some advice
Love yourself with all you've got
And please, stop begging for it (love)
Stop showing your legs for it
If you cultivate dignity for yourself and
Love yourself
True love is guaranteed forever.

What a trivial title
for a trivial poem
What I consider meaningful
Is just mere dirt to someone else

It all comes down to what you believe in
And what you believe will make you happy and make you whole
That is where meaning is held

I awake tired and the snippets of my dreams that I recall perplex me
I ponder: What is my subconscious trying to tell me
But I find no pattern with the fragments
And I leave it be for another unsolved mystery.

Is everything OK in my life?
Or is everything falling to pieces?
I can't seem to discern this clearly
My perceptions are distorting my view on reality
But even if life was beyond everything I have ever hoped for right at this moment
I couldn't fathom pure happiness
In this strife ridden world

Mermaids exist through our mind's capacity to fantasize
And that's where happiness comes from
Our ability to conjure something that is not real or is scarce on earth
Happiness is as real as mermaids.

Open yours eyes
Let go of sweet alibis
You know those are just sugar coated lies

Open your eyes
I am standing in front of you
Quiet the chaos inside
You've got to get out of there
I took a peek inside your brain
and I've got to say,
Those voices sound quite insane

But don't pay mind to those voices
They do not own your name
They are just voices that feed the lie that you're not okay
That you'll never meet the measure
Just open your eyes,
And experience life and all of it's pleasures

I'm standing here before you,
Can't you see me?
A living, breathing, sentient being
Your internal chaos has vanquished you
It has stolen your sight
All you can see now are the lies that rule your life

Open your eyes,
I'm here for you and I understand
Can you not move, can you not feel?
I reached out my hand
Now reach out yours,
I will grab hold of it
And lift you up from the floor

Open your eyes
Love stands before you in all of it's purity
But you are unsure and full of insecurities
I bestow my love with no requirements or
debts
Because my heart  just gets stronger
The more I love unconditionally,
So, let me in,
Please

Open the eyes of your heart,
And finally, you will see.

I am a gem
A raw glowing crystal of the earth
With a multitude of sides and angles

I am a spectrum on a continuum
This continuous continuum called life
Forever going, with no thought of me
Existence has no thought of anyone, in fact
And no concept of reality, neither can it perceive the toll it's negative experience allotments has on the individual's life
But existence cannot be blamed, for the hurt it causes us is purely unintentional,
You have to give existence credit for it's intentions--
There are no intentions beheld by the unconscious, therefore if existence were to be personified it would be a neutral force,
though it's impact on our fragile lives from the moment we are conceived and officially a zygote is life-shattering at times,
yet weaved ever so magically through our sadness is joy and the satisfaction of conquering the elements that possess the potential to defeat us.
After every conquest we do become an increment stronger,
though at times we obsess over the bruises we have acquired through our personal wars
Yet, without your struggle, who would you be?

I'm never good enough
You're never good enough
We're all never good enough
We're all not "just right"
These ideas of lack keep us up all night
But if you just let go to those false and self-defeating perspectives
Your true genius would shine, and who could ever put an end to the pure beauty of a soul that emanates the oneness of the source?
We must do away with Capitalism, for it is the source of our discontent and feeling of never ending lack
In the end, we all regress back to a state of being out of touch with the world and being in awe of it simultaneously
When our brains slowly fade back into nonexistence, just like we were before our parents were impregnated with us
Sometimes, you just have to stop and ponder over the cycle
And you start to think about who established the cycle
Which leads to an array of contemplation
One inquiry flowing smoothly but swiftly to the next
My head fills up so quickly with the substance of inquiry
That I can become rather depressed
And it's not the type of depression that's easily cured with rest
It comes to a point where I become obsessed
With finding and deciphering all the answers
That my outward life begins to lose zest
Yet my internal life is growing so rich and so diversely composite that if I were asked to describe my ideas and opinions they would be completely ineffable
I read voraciously, but my mind has a unique system of filtering the articles of myriad genres that I read into this sui generis amalgamation
I have to be careful when I open my mouth to speak
Since my opinions deviate astronomically from the norm
I choose my words wisely to avoid being called insane and treated with scorn.
Since I have to keep most of me a secret, specifically in this provincial vicinity
My heart whispers love to me throughout the day
So I keep the love for my true identity ignited.

I can't deny that subjectively, at times, I view my disposition as a condition that is a contributor of my plight
But objectively I have chosen to wield my sword of might and trudge through this fight
Because I know, just like at the end of every fairy tale is a happy ending
That through the thorny bushes I walk through and all the villains I meet on the way that try to take my life
Their is a sunlit horizon somewhere awaiting me
Awaiting my unique and magical company
Somewhere where I will truly be able to fulfill all of my heart's desires.
Truly, your location is not prejudiced to your desires, but some of the places that you will live will require more courage to fulfill them.

I have many sides, many traits and many distinct ways
About me
But if you want to get to know me quickly and know all of me in one simple image
I will tell you of who I became when the nutcracker played at the end of this children's movie I watched as a toddler
I would intensely imagine the scene that song evoked for me
Coming into character so authentically and indistinguishably from who I was
Out of all of my traits, this one was the one I can recall from the beginning and the one I never lost
My imagination and my strong ability to think visually
Attribute this to genetics, possibly an inherited slight increase of glial cells in my brain (do a google search of glial cells and creativity...
Sometimes, I have to remind myself that Google is not an all-knowing god, even though I ask it just about everything)
So this is who I am
I know myself very well,
but I'm still trying to figure the whole world out.

The writer's life
Consists of looming strife
For a writer's eyes are keen
To the suffering that usually goes unseen

All writers are bearers of truth
Wielding their pens like a scalpel that cuts through
All the **** we tell ourselves
That keeps us in denial

A writer seeks truth incessantly
And eventually comes upon the somewhat ambiguous answer
That all truth originates from Love
How does the writer's analytical mind
Grapple with such a fluid concept?

The writer sees beauty in the invisible
Writes poetry on bathroom stalls
Lives life solely for stories
The writer feels things deeply but doesn't speak them,
But rather scribbles her thoughts fervently in a notebook
The words dancing on the page
As they are released from the tip of the pen
The writer knows, sadly, that even though she writes stories to make people feel less alone
That these people will never truly ever understand her and neither will
She ever be able to fully embody the experience of another human

The writer has wounds that go deeper than you could fathom
When no one was there to turn to,
She picked up a notebook instead and released the toxic emotional build-up in her head
Made art out of her sadness on the page
Through poetic words,
Elusive and enigmatic,
She could tell her story, indirectly
And still set herself free from the ******* of unspoken miseries

The writer's life is a privileged one indeed
For we see things, but don't speak them
But rather transcribe them forever in our memories
Until we find a clean sheet of paper,
And write
Write everything we've seen, heard, tasted, felt, known and intuited
Every struggle and every victory
Meticulously crafted upon the bare canvas
Like a war zone with an abundance of pent up zest
Finally unleashing itself upon the page
So, write, my fellow Writers
Write fearlessly
And our stories will prevail
They will impact even just one person
Who thought they were all alone,
Perhaps like we once felt.

“I talked to a calzone for fifteen minutes last night before I realized it was just an introverted pizza. I wish all my acquaintances were so tasty.
” ~ Jarod Kintz

I can't seem to understand
These happenings
Scraped and leathered hands
Wipe away the stinging tears
Of this ardous transformation
Saying goodbye to everything
That no longer
Feeds me
Pulling from my old, tight skin
Growing into
The skin I was meant to be in.

Hello,
former lover of mine
I love you

Why must we be apart?
The distance between us is breaking my heart.

I remember days when you professed unrelenting love for me
Where did those days go?
Why must those days repeat in my mind's eye?

In desperate attempts to forget you I seek out other foreign lovers
But none compare to you
They distract me for a little while
But once I am done with my futile relations with them,
I throw them away
And hope and pray that I will see you again, soon, someday.

I think to myself: Is everyone around me spellbound by the mediocre?
Or set up within a dogmatic routine?
I am not quick to call someone unintelligent,
but I disagree with the way people are using their intelligence.

Lover once mine,
Why did we part?
You were my only companion that truly knew,
and thought like me too
You were my twin flame

Could I really ever get over you?
Could we ever get over the wounds we inflicted onto each other?
I am such an idealist and I really think we could
But you're a realist...
So, my love, do you think we should?

The meadow glows with a soft ambivalence
The air is humming with the chattering of birds
They try to do their best to impress with nests of decadence
But eyes aware see through the facade
My heart dreamt of days when wounds will be shared
In circles of trust and love
To heal that which congeals, and blocks the flow of love

I spent some time to tread the earth as a sojourner,
I set out alone
Though I never felt lonesome
The world spoke to me,
The earth kept me company
Her symphony carries through the universe
I felt loved and warm
I felt found
Though some may have described me as lost.
I was so profoundly found
In the company of the earth.

At night I would travel to the silver moon
And dance upon her
I would see the world below me
Blue and green and beautiful
My heart felt like a treasure beating in my chest in that moment
There was so much to be grateful for,
And there always has been.

Glowing faces
In beautiful destinations
Saying "Pay me so I can show you how to live like me"
Give them your money, your time
Their joyous lives fill your Instagram feed,
Filling you with a insatiable need
To consume what the lifestyle they are selling

Life coaches, spiritual masters, transformation guides
All these people who've got the life
While you turn to them
Through your screen
Looking to them to tell you what life means
They say "Pay up, happiness isn't free"
And you scramble in search for money,
Because they say they sell what you need

You work your nine to five,
And live your tired life
You try to make ends meet
Your kids are ungrateful,
Never looking up from their myriad screens
Your husband left you
In search of a woman who looks like she could be in her teens
You eat your ramen, no, it's not gluten free
You wonder how your life got to this--
In two words: Miserable drudgery

You go on social media,
Look at all these lifestyle gurus
Talking about how happy they are
That they could burst at the seams
They've got the money,
And the perfect honey
And the luxuries,
They take selfies on distant beaches,
Smiling cheek to cheek
They are happy
And they are trying to sell you their lifestyle

They create e-courses, e-books, e-everything-and-anythings
On how to follow what they did
to become so happy, so wealthy, so blessed
It's all a mindset, they teach
You can get anything you desire
If you work hard enough for it

It's a revolution,
With all these self love lifestyle gurus
Infiltrating social media
But are we selling our souls,
To these people
who don't truly understand
What it's like to be you?
What it's like to be financially poor,
Abandoned and lonely,
Unattractive by society's standards,
I'm not saying they haven't been through
their own stuff,
But can you really commodify a lifestyle?
Can you put a price tag on helping others?
Especially when that price tag is thousands of dollars?
This help is for the privileged,
And those that need help the most
will go without,
as usual

I guess I just crave humility
In this selfie culture,
I truly ache for authenticity,
Real helping,
Real healing,
And not all of this showiness,
Disguised as expressing gratitude for your amazing life
On social media

Perhaps we can all wake up
From the spectacular little daydream of our own lives
To the reality of the worldwide suffering going on right at this moment
Maybe if we stopped posting about the atrocities on the news,
Got off our phones
And did something to change our world,
Things would be different.

Speaking up
For myself,
And you
Speaking up for the Universe

No need to sit back in fear
No need to be anyone's victim
You're stronger than you think
You're passionate about a cause
And it doesn't matter if they don't care

Burn the record of how many times you've been knocked down
Stand up, stand up
Don't ever ever give up
Cause you're too strong to surrender
So we got to stop pretending

Our minds are on fire
In our hearts: an insatiable desire
So why are we wasting our lives away
In our own figurative caves
Do you hear your call to change?
It's time to get up and change yourself
So we can change the world.

Know your genes
Know what they mean
Know what they say
Know what they whisper
Know what they pray
Know what they want
Know what they hunt
Know why they hurt
Know why you're messed up.

Scientists say I have no control
I just got here billions of years after a big bang,
no,
not the big bang my parent's performed during coitus
But a magnificent explosion of stars
And their is not one reason I am here
And all the conflicting reasons for life that we have were created for the purpose of comfort.
Right.
And I am made up of layers and layers of organic substances
The very act of living is a miracle to me (All scientists are free to shake their head in fervent disgust over my statement)
Science wants to tell me that I am ****** because of my genes
Did the government pay you to spread misinformation?
Instead of focusing on how ****** the individual is,
Can we take a moment to discuss how ****** every aspect of our world is?
You can't explain away logically.
You can try.
But until you accept the truth your logical excuses will only and always generate more questions.

Slumber
Through decay
Slumber through the whole day
Time just keeps ticking away
And night creeps stealthily and soon
Until there is no more light, not even from the moon

Go on, let us continue in our sleep
Let's continue numbing the truths we wish not to speak
For even I know our future is bleak,
For even I know our future is bleak

I may not spend all my hours
Educating myself on politics
I'm out chasing butterflies like I'm still 5
But it doesn't take a smart person to know
That if we collectively continue in the direction we are heading
It will all go...
Their will be no more earth to sow
No more life to grow

I guess, maybe
This Universal death is inevitable
Natural, though catastrophic
Like frightened animals anticipating a storm
We're in a frenzy, running in circles
Turning to myriad vices and hollow hopes
Only to reach the final day
And realize,
Transcendence was not to be avoided
For through transcendence
We awaken

This darkness, Unshakable
Me- So very breakable
All you see
Is the shell, quaking, aching
Outside of me
And me, contained inside
Hidden away from real life
Because if I spoke my radical ideas out in the open
My life would become broken
Like glass shards strewn across a wooden floor
My feet would bleed but my heart would bleed more

The lackluster people cannot comprehend
The ideas outside of tradition and systems and dogma
And forgive me for my stuttering and reserved nature
It takes time for the shackles to melt
For I must be certain that I can be my true self
And express myself with no filter, then the lock on my vocal cords will open
It takes a skilled blacksmith to break me free from my chains
So I can feel at ease

Sometimes, it feels like people are my disease
Society, groupthink...
Can cause so much trouble
I know I must take responsibility for the way I feel
And steer clear of blame
But I'm constantly thinking,
If only we all thought for ourselves,
If only we truly stuck to our morals
And weren't afraid to be aberrant,
Then maybe we'd have more people like Nelson Mandela,
Gandhi, Rosa Parks, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King Junior, Abraham Lincoln (and many more) in this world
None of these people were perfect, and some of these people sustained traumas and lived as pariahs in their communities and even in their entire countries
But to some who are outliers, these people were heroes
And thankfully they are regarded as heroes by the vast majority today
Sometimes to live a big life beyond triviality,
We must say no to comfort, our ego, our limiting beliefs
And say yes to a self-less life replete with love, curiosity and abounding possibility

This darkness that overcomes me intermittently and unexpectedly
Can only be conquered
By "looking at the bigger picture" and
Recognizing that even though I often times feel like I don't fit in
And I refuse to assimilate to a subculture because I will not sacrifice the lifelong endeavor of adding to a reservoir of knowledge and wisdom
For ignorance and blind faith and groupthink
Where people are discouraged from having their own unique and radical ideas that defy tradition or what the majority are subjected to believe through the indoctrination of an institution like a school or church
All I can do to defeat the darkness is to surrender to this condition I find myself in
Being full of life and ideas
But feeling like I have to hold it all back in this provincial town to be
"Acceptable"
But I think I'm just going to let the light shine through
I'm going to speak up, speak out
And not become some pseudo spiritual guru who charges an arm and a leg to gain access to their "life altering" retreats and seminars
People are always looking outside of themselves to "find enlightenment" or the next fix that will "fix" them
But we get hooked to these life coaches churning out programs with high price tags like drugs
We need to feel competent, worthy, and purposeful
We dream about becoming just like these people ripping us off
But they're just as clueless as us,
They're just rich off of our clueless-ness and desperation
But I'm going to try something different--
I'm just going to be myself, stand up for my rights and the rights of others
Live a life of service, even if that entails radical service where my life is on the line
Stop seeking validation from people who don't matter
And not give the enemies I will inevitably make by being myself any importance in my life and my life's mission
So, that's it folks
I hope you decide to do the same.

Your words once intoxicated me
I inhaled deeply, against my better judgement
And allowed you to engulf me,
both my heart and my psyche
I ignored the lies
And reveled in the ignorance
Until the inevitable day came
When truth dawned on me like a blinding light
And obliterated every lie in it's white hot truth

I'm still in denial,
Not anymore about you
But about everything
The fact is that I'm an addict
to numbing myself
Because I can't face life's harsh realities
So I just keep running
Into oblivion
I shoot myself up with vices
Blindly wasting time on devices
And all sorts of unfulfilling endeavors
And so my double-mindedness persists
My my pain echoes loudly between my ears, and my gratitude is running low
But there is a deep inner knowing within me
that tells me, ever so softly
"Violet, you have to grow"

I board a public bus
A graying bus driver is a woman and then morphs into a man
A normal experience within a dream

My eyes glaze over as I assume a state of aloofness
As I tend to do when surrounded by unfamiliar people
As some sort of defense mechanism
As if the otherworldly look in my eyes
Will thwart the formation of an ill intention forming in the mind of a stranger that occupies the bus with me
Just in case

Two older men are on the bus
I don't validate their existence
When I am aloof
It feels like I am the only person truly alive
Everything gradually grows dimmer
As my inner world roars as loudly as an amphitheater.

The bus drives for hours
I've never been on this bus before and I've never been to the town I am traveling to
I'm going there to check out a church
Even though I'm not a Christian
Hours pass...
I start falling asleep in my dream
The bus has no stops

Finally, the bus reaches the end of its route
I am dropped off in front of a CVS along with the other two male passengers
One scruffy old man leers at me and smiles at me
But I act as if I didn't see him
I have no idea how to get to the church
It's getting dark
All that is around is the CVS, the bus stop, and a road with an onslaught of cars driving in either direction
Why did I make this hours long trip if I didn't even know exactly where I was going?
If only I could cross the wide street to get to the other side where the bus stop for the bus back home is
But I can't
The cars were driving at fast speeds and their was a constant flow of them
So I stood in that nakedness of uncertainty and abounding possibility
Stuck and calculating
As the sun set over this foreign place I ended up in
All because I was seeking some purpose
And yet, it brought me so far away from home,
the comforts and luxuries and certainties of home
Yet, when I awoke, something deep and vital within me knew
That I will never find my purpose within the comfort of my home.

Thank you for destroying me,
Dear ex
I had never loved another so deeply,
Or let down my walls more
Than I had with you
And what did you do with me?
You tortured my soul
And burned me like embers
You toyed with me
Making promises you knew deep down you would fail to keep,
But still,
I thank you
For destroying me

Because, you see
You were the fire I needed
To burn away
All the parts of myself that were inauthentic,
Turning to ash all my ego,
Obliterated my sense of self
Losing you and all of the promises you made
Was like losing one version of my life,
That I had come to cherish so much
It was like being the captain of
The sinking titanic,
Choosing to die
With the damaged ship

But I reemerged from that icy misery I existed in for so long,
Realizing that **** happened
And I couldn't do anything to change that
But what I could do
Was take the actions required to have the life I want,
Instead of wasting my time wallowing over how someone I once loved
Hurt me,
Almost destroyed me,
And we called that love
But it WOKE ME UP
It destroyed me and woke me up,
Do you understand?
Yes,
I lost something I had invested so much time and love and care into,
But I can't control that
And it's time to reconcile with the pain,
By making peace with the past,
So I can live in the right here, right now,
In the present.

Spiced Autumn air
Swirling through my home
It peppers my memory
With sadness and hope

It brings me back to seven years ago,
I was a broken-hearted girl
Perplexed over the telephone,
I tried so hard but he had made the decision to close his heart

But here I am now,
Older and wiser
Still dreamt of his distance last night
But truly,
My waking mind is over it

It's just my life is a river
And I'm going deeper into it
Once on the surface
There was so much agitation
So I held my breathe and went under,
Trying to fix the cause of my turbulence

I've definitely healed,
And learned a lot
Both the easy way and the hard way
These little internal shifts
That I've been making gradually
For seven years
Have produced something beautiful in me
Breaking through the seams of my previous tortured being

This river is winding,
So I never know what awaits me
But I've married uncertainty
Knowing it's always pregnant with possibility

I haven't met any cultural milestones
I'm not cool, popular or trendy
All I have to offer this world
Is a broken heart on the mend
But still I'm full of gratitude
And calling in more
For though on the outside
I don't appear to have arrived
I have a root of joy inside my heart
And it's rapidly proliferating
As my gratitude grows.

Words are pointless
I listen, people are dumb
I open my mouth to speak
I try to push out the words-- my brain has none.

Sleep is pointless
I have so much research to do
What's all this research for?
I implore, I implore
My mind wants more.

Am I being told the facts?
Or just versions of the facts in which truth lacks?
Skepticism is driving me mad
Have you ever let knowledge drive you to the brink?
Must I stop what is natural to me: to think?

Thinking is pointless.
Now nothing is hopeless
Because once I stop thinking
The death in the truth will not be seen
And I can live carefree and dream.
I can live my life whichever way I please.
Just like everyone else is doing around me.

But no, I choose a different path
The one of aberration
I choose not to live a pointless life along with the masses
I am reaching out to a higher awareness
No matter how many times this course puts me in the throes of sadness.

This is a poem for the ones who go unseen,
the ones who go unnoticed,
Who go through their life in a quiet reverie
Though they are of few words
There entire life is a dream
They don't get an influx of likes on social media,
No one is begging them for dates
They just do what they need to do,
While blending nicely into the background
Their minds are loud
But there lips refuse to make a sound

This is for the ones
Who think they don't belong
No one can see their pain
Because no one looks close enough these days
We're a surface level generation
Praising fool's gold
We fill our mind's with aggravation
And our lives are either extremes
of mania or stagnation
But then there are the unseen
Still reveling in all the simple things
They are the unobtrusive rebels of society,
The true rebels really
For they don't rebel on Instagram
They rebel, unwittingly,
For everything they do
Is in opposition to popular culture

I write this
To remind you all
To not overlook the underdog,
For they are the most riveting of people
Though they don't build a personal brand and a steeple
To advertise their life
They are the most genuine folk
Without a lick of pride

I haven't always been so cognizant
of the underdog's pain
I connect with them the most, of course
Because they really listen to me, and make room for my authenticity
But at times I've chosen to be vain
Ditching the underdog for the "cooler" crowd,
And all for social gain
And yet, surrounded by people with whom I do not have a sense of belonging
Loneliness echoes in my heart,
And it amplifies when I'm trying to fit in
It leads to deafening silence
And in the dead of night, hours of crying

But you don't need to be born an underdog
To change this social conditioning
For our whole lives our culture has programmed us to be on a mission,
To be better, more efficient
So we can gain success, so we can have superficial love
We're not merely automaton's with minds
We're sentient beings, with hearts that need to love
And *we're alive

i appreciate the ache
that comes from
a long day of walking in the sun

like a keepsake
is the joy tucked in my heart
after a day of choosing to smile
and laughing on purpose

some days i feel so connected
so entwined
with everyone and everything
i feel the joy swell through me
and produce love and peace in me

my mind and heart becomes as tranquil as a babe coddled in maternal arms
i rest in this eternal love

i love the ache
of a body well lived
and well loved.

It's all making sense now
As I watch from a lowered head
The universe is expanding
As everything in my reality is coming to an end

I just wonder, Who have I become?
Because I experience myself within the hooks of society
Quiet obedience and detached formality
Engaging in the dance that is expected of me

I've had dreams that made me scream
But they dissolve like iridescent beads arising from my mind
Where is the magic,
In the veins of the earth?
The streams that overflow?

I take a step beyond
Into the streams
And it dissolves the rigid conformity, the chains that bind me
I feel my heart and mind merging with the One
The One who will save me
From myself,
And every ingrained idea of who I need to be...

Set me free.

Am I your rose?
A unique love under the bell jar?

I look at you, You look at me
Your prussian blue eyes
Pierce my being

A love that is ethereal,
Divinely orchestrated
A symphony of sweet surrender
The Angels sing I love you

Come to your rose,
Tend to me
I am no common rose
I am your rose,
I am unique in all the world,
Because of the time you have wasted on me.

Could this be a perfect day?
I'm out sitting on a cliff
Looking out into an expansive blue sky
White clouds adrift
The sun, so orange, on my skin,
Sun-kissed

Here on this cliff
I took everything I am attached to
Everything that is slowly eating away at who I truly want to be
And steadily,
One by one
I threw the things I love
Into the sky
And while I cried,
I also felt joy well up inside.

I've been making changes everyday
Since I decided I didn't like the way
I felt and thought
And I only realized today
Seeing myself in the mirror, that I'm different
I speak different now
I smile different now
I think different now
I'm different

It's like, I'm different
But exactly the same
It's hard to describe
It's just I have so much less pain
Before i was stressed and
Hurting
Always disconcerted
But now that's lifted,
I feel loved, light, gifted

This is for all the hopeless, that see no point in
Continuing on in their transient misery
Well, this is my testimony
And I hope you take it to heart
And treasure it as a keepsake,
It serving to remind you and convince you
That your ailing heart
Won't ail forever
Things change, life gets better.

When I'm in my pain
I feel as if I could bear
a thousand scars
and still survive.

As one realization after another
rose up in me and wrecked my mind,
while remembering their loveless behavior
I suddenly understood that
Letting go
starts with the truth.

There's a problem eating at me
I'm attached but I need to unlatch
Because this thing is tearing away at me
And closing up my heart
Causing blindness to worldwide kindness

An Optimist I am
And I fall over and over again
But I haven't lost my legs
I get up and I beg
For God to sustain me
Not to refrain from me

Some things can leave you feeling small
You gave it your all
You expected to grow tall
With love and invincibility
But all you have acquired through this is a sense of invisibility
You ponder: How could I have been so silly
But you know
If you never tried
You'd never know why it's important to live and fight
For life, for your life
For what is right
To live a fulfilling life

When the river is blocked with a pile of rocks
And everything is just clogged
You're not going anywhere
But the certainty of staying is comforting yet delaying
That's when my heart reminds me:
It's time to be praying.

And I break down
I resist
For in this misery I persist
This sickness is so sweet
In it I find a distorted relief
Who ever knew you could find comfort in grief?
My prayer at first is brief
Quick sentences that cut to the chase
Like numbing actions in attempts to erase
But God says: No, no, you've come to me, now I'm going to open your heart even more so
And you feel big and you feel small
But you know that whatever happens, you grow
He breaks you down, he lifts you up
He exposes your mindset, but He never gives up
On you
The unique one
Dazzling and one of a kind
A child of God
You, God's child
Ain't that grand

What a relief
More than relief
You've risen up from grief
Yet again, you can see!
The scales drop from your eyes
And no longer do you roam the streets
Like a beast
Seeking it's lost feast
With an inconsolable appetite
It seeks pleasure all through the night
But nothing would ever completely satisfy
The animal we have inside

When we attempt to tame our inner animal
Many times we fail
We can get disheartened and say: I NEVER PREVAIL!
But turn to God
And he will be the wind in your sails
Propelling you to prosperity and love and care

No matter what, I leave this to God
I've tried too hard and now I have nothing left
I've given too much and I've made myself blind and sick and deaf
Please God, rescue me from these murky deep waters I drown in
Stretch out a finger and pull me to safety
Remind me of my worthiness and an outpouring of love place in me
Let me trust this spontaneous turn
Because it's not quite spontaneous, for You have set out my path
Before my conception
Any time I call on you, you replenish my soul with a resurrection.

There are things in life that seem so good, seem so fine
I say, If only I had that I would be fulfilled
But I trust my journey, I trust you God
You are my unfaltering Rock

If it were not for death then we would not have life
So let me get rid of what is not serving me anymore
Embrace life and milk it for everything it is for
I know that if I just ask
You'll give me more
More love, more worthiness, more compassion
Bless me and allow me to live my life with passion!
Heck, I'm only here once,
So let's make this happen!

This is interesting
My heart is writhing
I desire to see him
But the thought of that being a reality makes me depressed
This clearly doesn't make sense
I think my anxious mind needs some rest

In his presence
I cannot breath
And yet, I do not want to leave
If a smile is all we exchange
I spend the rest of the day in a happiness I cannot explain

I soak in a bath of self imposed pain
And I very well think this negativity is vain
When he beholds me in his eyes I hope I seem sane
His merely speaking my name
Makes me fall a part
And I have to pick myself up in shame
I just cannot explain...

It's like dying and being reborn
Like being an exploding star
Cascading neuropeptides dancing with my human heart
Signals like fireworks go off in my brain
When he's near
And he can't hear the craziness going on inside,
but I still fear

Clear icicles hung outside my bedroom window
Outside the world was frozen
Blanketed in a thick layer of snow
Sparkling winds carrying snowflakes on it's wings blew in
From the cracks of the window frame
I close my eyes and connect to a vestigial child-like whimsy
A smile breaks out on my face that I can't contain
The winds lift my spirits
And rejuvenate my hollow heart
In this moment I can feel it
My world falling a part
And even though I can see it
I welcome this new start
I am ready to surrender this life of empty striving,
To have my hands free
For all the possibility awaiting me.

The music is perfect
The air smells of synthetic raspberries
Could life be more sublime?

What are the sources of my happiness?
The things that genuinely provide me happiness are merely the necessities for all humanity
And the items consisting of my individual interests are the fringe to what makes me happy essentially

Nowadays I can find fondness in bad memories
I can find something spectacular in anything
Is this proclivity a blessing or a curse
Only the times I use it will tell.

The boxer has so much rage
Pacing to and fro in within the safety of a cage
She is bright, mighty and powerful on the stage
Where all wild inclinations can be un-caged

Her brain burns violent red
Her anger originates from her head
In the grasp of aimlessness she lay in her bed
In the grasp of torture she wishes to have her pain bled

Maybe if she could see pain in her opponents eyes
She would understand why
We all have this inclination to fight
Why we become ruthless and inhumane through the darkness of our life

If she caused someone else to bleed
Maybe she could conceive the victory
With her punches--In making someone small
With her kicks--In making someone fall

Being kicked down, beat, and unwanted
Is all she ever knew from birth to now
She just needed to understand her existence somehow
Picking fights on the street isn't allowed
So she chose to fight an opponent for a crowd.

I'm running out of time
I think I've finally made up my mind
This life of mine just spirals and spirals again
And in the center of my life's cornucopia
Is you, again and again

People say don't waste time on what's not precious
Take life by the horns and ride into the pressure
But I ride the wave instead
I'm leisure sinking deep within melancholy glory
And your radiant beauty is what keeps my heart beating

Spirals, spirals everywhere
A girl, woman, lady, female
Looking, pondering, reminiscing
Always reminded and reminding
Welcomed into the world of endless wonder
To which the door lay between my eyes
In my mind is where infinite possibilities lie

Sweet succulence,
Dragged down to the pit of repentance
Life lessons are Catholic school nuns beating you with a ruler
But you survived and now you have no choice but to thrive

See, you hear
See? You hear the robin chirping up a storm outside your window
He's calling you to the day
But you rather lay in bed for the rest of the day
I'd like to think he'll miss me,
He'll miss me because, well, I lay in my bed and stave off sleep
But I'll dream of him
And he'll come for me
Oneday, he'll come,
You'll see
Because all my life spirals back to him
And all his life spirals back to me.

Goodbye Sunshine,
You were never real
You were merely artificial light
That I gave meaning to
You never touched the drapes of my windows
Because you were never the sun
Only the real sun comes through my windows like a lion
Bright golden yellow,
Keeping me from my dreams
Because finally, I find my bliss in reality

How can I fathom leaving this delusion?
I have all these poems about you,
Inspired dreams, hopeful writings about you
And yet, here I am
I dug the grave
To bury the dream my wild imagination created
My imagination, always going too far down the rabbit hole,
Until my glasses are traded in for
Virtual reality goggles
And all I could see
Is my fantasy unfolding right in front of me

Here I am, on this oddly warm day
In January,
Laying my figment of you down to rest
How can I let go,
When I never truly got to feel and see
What it would be like
To be yours
Maybe I wouldn't have even enjoyed it.

New
Like the dawn
The glorious sunrise
Pinkish hues awash with silent beiges
And the sun
Is a fiery orb
Coloring life into every living thing

I feel the new
With my breath
In and out
And I think of the ocean
The powerful ocean
I can feel it within my heart,
The waves rumbling through my veins

I can see the new
In not so distant visions
Of a future full of growth
I’ve healed so much
And yet there’s more
More of the new
I open my doors
Let it all in
All the gloriously soothing beauty
Of life’s simplest pleasures
Healing me

There’s been a crack made in my lifelong illusions
I’m beginning to feel clarity, and not confusion
Saying yes yes yes
To more beauty.