Pollyanna can do,
Sounds optimistic to you,
Idealism for me and you,
No  need to wake up blue,
Women are a capable crew,
Most stuff we're equal to,
Put on your positive thinking cap,
Pollyanna can do, that's that.

And…
The farms are
becoming housing
Developments.

Farewell
to the
Amber waves of grain.
How long
shall liberty still
rain?

Is the well
spring of opportunity
going to become
dry?
Will it
leave us
poor
wretches
to die?

Dear Columbia
I beg of thee
Do not turn
your glorious face from
me!

This is what the old heads say.
“You must learn you make your way!”
Broken memories of D-day
or the Mai Kong
haunting like spectres
or a beautiful
song.
Staccato maxims,
like bullets,
sing a ******
truth
as they pierce
the red-hot idealism
of
youth.

So do not forsake me,
dear Columbia.
I,
your broken son,
stand before you
blinded
by the future
you promised.
This night is
illuminated by those
burning Amber waves.

And…
the farms are
becoming housing
Developments.

Child, please look up.
I know you don’t want to listen.
But you will, you will take what suits you.
I know you well.
Stop, wait,
You don’t need to blur the lines.
There is no black and white–
I know you’ve learned that the hard way,
but just wait– don’t shade just yet.

There is a certain grey.
But don’t rush– hush,
Put the paintbrush down.
You don’t need to sin to understand.
Child, I’m sorry you’re so lost.
Take it from me:
You’ll be fine.
You’ll be fine.

Dear Sanity,
In the night, I wake to find myself without your company, but the warmth of the chain about my neck keeps you at the forefront of my mind. The heavy links rake across my flesh searing your disapproval; pulling me to your ankles so that I might kiss them for mercy. Branded at the chest by this heart of yours, though, I am the very antithesis of your will. I was seduced by the comfort of your homogeneous masses and tempted by the fruits of my curiosity. Yet, it is through fire—the deep passions of my essence—that I will be reborn. And you, who I loved through the eyes of others, will HOWL at my betrayal! Then stand upon your mountain peak and bludgeon me with reason so that I might know what your light looks like.  

To what end? So that I might cling to this chain, this keepsake, which I did not need until you bestowed your judgment. Yes, judgment, though you would have me believe it is your friendship, your safety, your sympathy. Like the swelter of a thousand suns you oppress me saying, “Keep quiet your ***** yearning!” So who would know better, the hour of my discontent, than you who watches me, unblinking, during the day? It is here, at the tween of night, that I shed the scales from my eyes and throw off your burden of want—the goals for which you leave me always pining, but never appeased. Is this shirking to seek the dark? So be it. I will cloak myself in blood—for all that I am wrong—and dance in the pale light of the unassuming.
—Pandora

--------------------

And the faces of the homogeneous masses drew forthwith to witness dawn.

In a drawer,
There was found,
A locket with
A minor crown—

Of leaf: laurel,
And shaded night.

When opened up
All succumbed to fright.
For found inside
Was a broken light;

Pandora’s hope
Had lost the fight

i
She was sick of hero's,
of the boys who tried to save her from herself.  
Her world had become a constant blur
of innocent liplocks and hair neatly parted,
of well-made beds and early curfews,
of speed limits and no trespassing signs.  
She was trapped within the parameters of goodness,
condemned to the ideas of sweetness.  
She wanted to succumb to something,
to submit herself to the darkness of a boy who didn't want to be fixed.  It was a realization she had the night she saw him,
truly saw him,
a boy who had been a stranger in a bar
and weeks later became the fixation she couldn't manage without.  

ii
One night he appeared in the doorway of the bedroom,
soft blue light illuminating his face,
nestled behind his nose
and under his lashes.  
The crease of a smug grin forming at the corners of those lips.  
He knew exactly what he did
and it tempted her all the more.  
He was a villain, a cold blooded creature, a criminal.  
His mouth reminded her of the demons in all of her nightmares,
the hooded figures reaching out to grasp her hands
and pull her in with only the gentlest touch
to let her think she was still in control.  
Those haunted sheets and his pouted lips
were enough to keep her stirring until dawn.  
He hadn't even touched her,
but he managed to keep her squirming under the thought of him.  
He was salt in her eyes and sugar on her tongue.  
He had shown her the true meaning of corruption.

iii
And then it was over.  
She wasn't sure they were done,
but she left anyway.  
He screamed and told her to do what she wanted,
but she chose to live.  
His tousled hair had become too messy for her,
his temper didn't exclude her anymore.  
She was not weak,
she was terrified.  
She was drowning.  
And when the sea had finally come for her,
he didn't follow.  
The swells pulled her deep beneath the surface,
invaded her lungs
and the strain on her heart felt like his fingers across her ribs.  
He let the seas foam lap against his toes
and then watched her foam at the mouth,
her pupils dilated,
skin pale.  
She was swallowed by the swift currents,
consumed by bursts of blue,
his eyes no longer defined the color.
He wasn't there.  
Those nights spent over the bathroom sink,
perched on the fire escape,
hidden beneath sheets,
he wasn't there.  
She knew the feeling all too well
and that things lose their shine under water.  
But at least she had found a home in the abyss.

You would figure
such a moment would be burned
into the paradigm of memory
when exactly did I learn
life was no cartoon?
well, it wasn’t one traumatic incident
rather a rushing current of events
a drunk uncle here, a screaming mom there
a belting boyfriend or toy-stealing sister
playmates picked dead last no matter
older boys bullying the younger
teachers who didn’t particularly bother
some cousins had yards and fathers
while others like me had neither
always more chores than fun
and no one ever explained how come
priests were less present and less kind
than the mexican street venders
there’s no specific scene to pause when I rewind
I honestly can’t remember.

It wasn’t at a funeral, by then
though I was young , I somehow knew
life was not all beautiful and true
that those adults who told me what to do
sobbed on dark beds and screamed at phones
then wiped their tears or ****** walls
before reentering the room
their eyes a little more like stone
while I pretended to un-see it all
and kept on playing with my toys, alone.