The vague shadow of an ancient oak pulsing
Like an image through static
Through drifting fog
So thick that only the wind
Can lift it and let slip
The outlines of
Where I began.

My ancestry is incompletely buried.
The sharp rocks of drunken nights
Slice upon the roots
Disfiguring, pummeling, smashing,
Rendering mute the stories their craggy hollows could tell
Dissolving in that same fear
My grandmother must have known so well.

I don’t know how to find her,
To reconstruct a broken form
From all of these pieces,
These fallen leaves that
Drift like secrets,
Like the ones my mother
Whispered to me in the dark
When I was nine and old enough
To hold them, to hold her,
When she fell apart.

Because they took them, you know.
My mother, her sisters, her brothers,
The county clipping the roots like
Plucking flowers,
Like it was nothing at all to scatter
Children in the wind,
Like fallen leaves upon the shallows
Of some lonely pond,
Like broken branches
Overpowered by a system that
Only wanted them
Gone.

So, you see,
It wasn't just the wind that ***** the tree,
But a system that decided
Whose voice to wipe away and
What to keep.

My ancestry is incompletely buried.
Sometimes, I'm sure I can hear her sobbing,
A broken, fragile song, emerging from the earth
Just where the roots, interlocking, stop
the dirt from completely blocking
The story of a battered woman
Buried for too long.

The vague shadow of an ancient oak pulsing
Like an image through static
Through drifting fog
So thick that only the wind
Can lift it and let slip
The outlines of
Where I began.

What if I run my hands along the bark,
The broken pieces, the empty spaces,
Where her voice might be?

Grandma, speak to me.

Trashbags

At seven he had already moved more times than the total number of years he had been on this Earth
And this time, like the times before it, he moved with his belongings in a trashbag. Stolen clothes, stolen belongings.
A suitcase, at least, would have added a small degree of dignity, and confidence to the whole affair - to being "placed" in another and another and yet another foster home before reaching 3rd grade
Trash Bags break,  you know
Trash Bags can't possibly support the contents of any life, and certainly not a life as fragile as this

When I first was taken away
I didn’t like to speak
I had nothing left in me to say
My biding was done
So most days from sun up to sun down
I sat at the dining room table
Surrounded by large windows
Letting in natural light eliminating the house
I sat and looked out the windows
Facing out the to the East
The large field grew tall with unkept grass
The trees barely blocking anything
Green everywhere in sight
And horses
Real horses running around in their yard
Not a mile across
Spending hours sitting, looking out
I’m not sure what for
I wasn’t searching for anything
Just glancing out with scratched glasses
Not focusing on any one thing
Mostly using the time to think
If things went any different
If what it was, wasn’t
If what would be, wouldn’t
Doing so for almost three years
But it now feels like a waste
It didn’t change a thing
Foster care is still foster care in the end
Now a part of my past
Thank God it didn’t last
And thank you to my now parents
For the adoption

When we were younger and didn’t really know how the world worked, we heard the story of our parents going into a patch and choosing their baby.

I often tell my family that I went into a patch and choose them.

I need to break free from these binding thoughts holding me down and tearing me up mind and heart racing in sync wondering if I'll fly or I'll sink I'll probably fall attempting to jump this wall of insincerity living or dying its all just the same dates in some notebook no hall of fame live your life but not my way just yours I have no choice but to come when you call down at your feet is where I will fall drawing me in with false love and hope  controlling my life like I'm some sort of dope I am not finished don't interrupt me until I say what I say I'm using my voice I'm calling your name now listen to me or get out of the way

I miss you kid
Everyday
I miss your sarcastic comments
I miss the way you frustrate yourself doing your hair
I miss your obsessions
I miss our song
I miss dancing in my room to your cds
I miss fighting with you over stupid things
I miss your chipped nails
I miss your glasses too far down your nose
I miss your references
I miss knowing all your crushes
I miss teasing you
I miss you teasing me
I miss **** date or marry
I miss your goody two shoes side
I miss your rebel side
I miss how proud you were of yourself
I miss your old confidence
I miss doing your makeup
I miss laying down and looking at the clouds
I miss everything
I missed you growing up
I missed you changing
I missed you becoming who you're not
You're gonna be in seventh grade in 6 months
And I'm not sure if I'll be there to see you off
I just want to be back with you
It's so scary being alone at that house, I know
I'm so proud of you and I love you
Stay strong kiddo

You're too young
You don't need the stress of knowing
How about the stress of not knowing
You expect me to be fine
Not knowing if my little sister is coming back
You expect me not to be *******
Not knowing if I'm staying
You expect me not to be scared
Not knowing what happened to my brother
You expect me to trust you
Not knowing who to believe
You put words in my mouth
Not knowing what to say
This situation
Is frustrating as ****
And you expect me to be okay
Well news flash


im not okay.

Hello all my wonderful friends and talented poets, I am seeking advice on the following poem. I find it challenging to edit. Thank you all, for your help in advance.


Lost, and no one is searching.
Not for me,
                   definitely not,
I'm just an "Orphan", and so you seem to see.

I'm scared of the upcoming events.
I'm at a loss for words that are heavy—lead...
Leaflet
of page flips,
a collection of what I can't prevent.
I, it's my expense.
~
I, I bend until I break because of things like this.
No one gets it,
No one will ever get this.
People I live with,
Say that I just need to "believe in myself, and be positive",
Again,
They don't get it.

I just write a lot; I just write...
I have a lot on my mind.
I hate the idea of moving.

The sight,
of a suitcase makes me go blind.

I wish I could spill my eyes
~ like ink ~
There are words I need to write, words have become a monster in my life, crawling up my spine, like waves, ebb, and flow - walls of wakes. I'm drowning in this lake, the weight pressed against me—the cracked skull, and my peeling
mind,
Nothing feels right,
they're all I can think
~ of, words, words enough to make me sink.
Into my hollow chest deep,
and empty.
But inside
my lungs find
a return together, and my diaphragm
fighting—like the closing mouth of a dying-clam.

So far away,
To a University
and Dorm-room stay,
I'm quite a fog, no definition-no importance—I fade
In the grey.
I fade away, every **** day.
Take it all away?
Silly me...
"No, stop being negative", they will say.

It feels like another Foster home,
I just want to go,
disappear - collapse into the undergrowth.
But inside I've never been so low.
Famished, insatiable, and ravenous, the beast still grows.
Chewing through what I've created for you,
To -
Just cut my tongue, and slice my toes
trying to hold.
On to the walls as they slip from my fingertips,
I fold.
Into my brain - filled with holes.
Into myself, a mystery—a candle melting without a flame, a game, that gets dull, and so old.
I've lost again, on this, I've been,
'Ashton' without
a doubt,
My words, I know -
My words know,
no woe.
Losing your interest, I'm only a muddled groan.
A man who is such a child, has to find a way to become grown.

I've no certainty,
Certainly, I cannot keep...
What I cannot see,
I cannot see where I'll be,
Who'll stay? Nobody?
Who would want to stay in my life?
No one needs to say that I,
have become a joke,
and as I choke, I know,
I'm not funny...
~
Nobody?
Not even me.

Hey,
I guess it's okay?
They don't stay.
It's always been the same.
My mind's leaving me.
Nothing will ever change.
All my life, I've been drifting, deranged. Slowly, I fear that I may
never find a refrain ~
That I'll love to be in this state
of mind, so insane.
—They never really did, and slowly,
Through my fingers, they...
Slipped.
Away.
From me,
and my weak grip, white knuckles behind the bleed.
- I wouldn't lie, I tried -
everything...
but it was my weakness that gripped
so I slipped'
like they did.

I guess,
I'm just going to have to get used to this.

I swear, I've been,
Lost, now I'm even more lost when
...I'm searching.
I'm looking
From outside of myself—in.

My ribs open,
I'm an open book, but now, I'm a loose-leaf—dropped with a pen,
~
I, to not be picked up again.

My skin is paper thin,
Go ahead take a look right in?

See what's really inside of me?
That my heart is just too big, to bear its own beat.
Maybe -
Maybe - my wounds will bring you to me?

I have so much love to give,
I cannot keep it contained within.

My heart is exploding,
and I know it...
This life is no longer mine to live.

Why do I feel like this?
Everything is going great, it is.
Yet something is amiss,
I'm reckless, I try, and end up defective.

I feel like I am obsolete.
           and when I fall asleep,
                           I don't even want to dream.
Thinking about more than I can think.
I've been getting better at buying,
The lies between
the pages of a book without a spine - me,
getting better at hiding
that I, I'm just, weak,
I'm obsolete.
Hung up by the seams,
~
A nail in the wall holding me.
A puppet without strings,
The nail has a name, 'PTSD'.
Hang me in the hall,
Watch me drop down, and fall
~
On my face in the heat,
Watch my colors-fade-to-grey
as they blend in the bleed.

A painting of melting color, that drips, and drips,
No worth, I'm worthless...

I'm just that foster kid from the streets.
The one that no one needs,
I don't want to be,
Believe me,
I woke up, and don't want to be me,
I just want to be free.

By: Ash