So
I couldn’t bring myself to do it
So what?
Love comes around and goes around
High school was never meant to last forever
Four years in hell
Is better than an eternity of being dead
Plus
That wasn’t always my outlook
So what?
People grow and I should be no different
Single on valentines again
For the fourteenth year
Is better than an eternity of being dead

Tiny bird, so full of hope
Longing to see the world beyond
Yet confined in its cage
Filled with illusions
Believing in a place
Where freedom reigns

Tiny bird, With crippled wings
Unable to soar
Above the endless sea
Chirping with faith
That its song will heal
Someone's distorted mind

Tiny bird, the door is open
A chance to take flight
And bathe in the Sun's rays
Look at how your eyes reflect
The glimmer of hope
That was once diminished

Tiny bird, harmed by cruelty
Taking a leap
Risking life for its desire
Against all odds
Tweets of delight echoes above
As a path has revealed

Tiny bird, with a world to explore
Unwavering in its pursuit
To see what lies beyond its cage
With mangled wings
He turns away
From the life that leaves him immobile

Oh, How Tiny I must appear
As this bird soars away

Sometimes you change
And so does your mentality.
You ain't recognize your taste,
Unfollow pages, cause now they bring anxiety.

Sometimes you change
And not only location,
But also people that you place
Around yourself, it's called prioritization.

Sometimes you change
And ain't making same decision.
New choices you now make
Do set new course and clear your vision.

A Child full of wonder comes home
And hangs her coat on a peg
She hangs her backpack
Her scarf and her mittens on a string
the new friends she made
the smell of a spring and freshly baked biscuits
And the sound of Mrs Townsend taking the register
She puts her headband on the peg, with her name painted on it in silver
And her jumper with her name sewn inside
The whirr of the acorn computer and the flash of coloured pencils
The shyness and worry about not fitting in
The wish to be seen but not be the centre of attention
The worry about nightmares coming true
The realisation that everything just like the day has to come to an end
I will always love you
She longed for a skipping rope
She ties the rope securely around the peg
How sturdy with all this weight
She stares at the peg proudly
She thought about her day and her hopes and her worries
and thought about how heavy they can sometimes feel
So she knows this peg is doing a great job
At taking the load

Sometimes I stick out from my friends a bit - I think. It’s the French in me. Americans have this excité-ment about things - that’s, well, exhausting.

Sometimes, when friends are jumping about, they practically plead for my engagement. I think I have a genetic, French reticence, an observer gene.

True, I have my moments of bitter COVID lock-down angst but I'm doing better than some friends. Maybe because the French live slowly - life is just moments - once a moment has passed, it’s gone.

I wait, in my secret gardens, like a cat on a settee, sipping small pleasures. The poet in me refuses to zone out - there are poems in the stillness.