your name echoes in my mind,
dancing-
on the windowpanes
where the rain falls,
drips down the cold glass,
making the world so bleary
-like waking up in the morning,
to the soft smell of warm chocolate.

the warm sweaters you wear,
they’re so unlike you-
-you, the girl who tells me three words when she’s afraid,
for me, the girl who can’t seem to float
and yet somehow i fly.
you’re all dark and softly-bright,
like cotton candy wisps and dark velvet necklace’s,
not warm burgundy and spiced hot chocolate.

one night, one fall night where the leaves were barely red,
i was afraid of you,
the way my skin turned to embers,
our shadows waving and flickering in the moonlight
yet now i cannot stop to wonder why the fire
turned to stone.

now i look into those eyes,
i see the sky laid about bare,
and my soul hanging by a thread in wonder,
hands touching.
you are the moon -going down in the sky,
giving birth to an easy morning in the country summers.
you are the stars, far points on light that call me home,
reach out to touch me from my place under you,
calling me to my dreams.

soft breaths against a soft cheek,
a warm head, with soft hairs mingling in your sweaters
-the way you lean over, no, not over,
but as if to cover mine keep it safe from the darkening sky and whirling leaves.
i am the lone girl under rattling metal rafters,
when they’ve all gone home,
and i,
standing alone in the dark wondering about you
am still under the rafters of a place that isn’t home.

long ago there was a beautiful girl by the sea,
and she told me that if
we can find love,
and that is all we can hope for.

she took my hand, and led me
down to the coves, to a woman,
who rested her hands on the rocks,
where the sea met the cave.

she whispered to me in the summer breeze,
as my linens rocked on the lines,
she led me across the sand
away from home.

when the skies grew dark,
she carried me home
across the grey waves,
she sang with the voice of storm rains.

as the stars came out,
she pulled herself onto the rocks beside me
and we lit lanterns
in the warm summer night.

i remember her as the winter sky
envelops the horizon,
as i gather my bags,
walk away from the caves we called home.

no longer does her voice sing in the coves,
nor am i allowed to become lost
in her teasing eyes,
let her voice lul me across the world.

all i have of her is a distant memory,
an echo of the voice that drives me mad,
the sounds of the water lapping lazily at the sand,
the smell of a warm summer breeze.

a soft touch -sand on my feet,
linens brushing my skin
rough rock under my legs,
and the ocean far below my cove.

it’s time to write our story,
because today feels like the first chapter.
today, i am determined to begin filling a book,
because our first chapter will look like hope.

the air was cool today, but when you breathed it out,
it came out smelling like the sweet fruits of summer,
sounding like soft waves sounding somewhere,
cautious feet barely touching the water.

i don’t know if you’ll take my hand tonight,
at the beach when i invite you into the water,
will you allow yourself to drown in it,
let the mermaids voices lull you into love?

do you think i could lull you into love
-i’m not a mermaid exactly,
but i could let you put flowers in my hair,
and make me like those beautiful angels of the sea.

please, please fall in love.
i like you, but that’s nowhere near enough,
i need to fall in love with
me.

can your heart-rate rise a little,
can your hands make my pulse flutter a little?
do you want to feel my heart rise,
soaring on soft dove wings for you?

you’re very kind (and you text me a lot),
so would be so kind,
as to fall in love?

some days, i feel the guilt churn in my gut,
like my insides have been replaced with syrup,
and i’m slowly being swallowed and crystallized in amber.
every secret i’ve kept from you whispers, begs to come out of my mouth,
because you love an illusion. but you’ve given the illusion so much love.

other days, i set the guilt on fire.
i feel oh so angry at you, for keeping us apart (unknowingly),
and i want to see your perfect world fall away,
as you realize that you’ve been living and loving,
me. the illusion.

underneath everything, i am tired.
i see circles like black holes form around tired bright eyes.
i see a lover, even though you think i do not have such love.
i see a secret, that burns like fire and strikes like storm.

you still see your happy girl
-but i am all that and so much more.

my dreams are still the same, my mother.
but there is another.
i dream that we walk together, i dream of her voice,
i dream of her in the night when i am alone and wonder why we can’t fall asleep hand in hand.

your lovely illusion is long gone,
resting in a beautiful of childhood
-with happy days, textbooks, the loud and strong proclamations:
saying that anyone who found such a love was a fool.

gone is the girl who you tell me about:
“i’m so proud that you listen to us and share our values -you’re wonderful.”
some days my mind screams
i do, i do, i do.

and others, it sneers are you.
it wants the ugly words to burst out like a swarm of angry bees
-yes i do. but i dream of women in ways you never would.
your perfect world would shatter, and we’d be destroyed.
my illusion holds it all together.

and i look up, and i see the day where no one needs my illusion anymore.
i’ll come to you with her, someone, her and sit down and tell you everything.
i was 15, mom. i love her. and whether i wish for it or not
-her world will shatter.

then i wonder, if she’ll be there one day.
i imagine walking down an aisle of roses.
i imagine flying to somewhere far away to ask for blessings
-their perfect worlds will shatter. to them, we’re barely not criminals.
but i hope they love us still.

and sometimes i imagine you,
and me,
in a place where we don’t have to worry.
doing things with each other that no one would ever imagine
-where no one will ever find out.

why is it such a crime to love you?
i love you. against all odds, i love you.

i love you when i’m told that love like ours is not the way we were made -that its disgusting.
i love you when people look at us and wonder who we are.
i love you when i worry about someone finding out about us.
i love you when i hate the world for trying to tear us apart.
i love you when someone says love.

sometimes, i think that is what i hide.
a long silk skirt of realities and lies,
swirling around our love.
and oh, that skirt casts a light like broken glass shards.

the first night, it was you.
there was no sky, and it was nothing.
but your name brought me to the edge.

the next night, it was the sky and the stars.
i didn’t think about you.
i was under the sky and in the water.
it had begun to grow cold,
and i had started to shiver.
but i was alone in the water.
i could lay on my back and i could see the stars.

a day later, i couldn’t not think about you.
i’m addicted to you.
the water was a cool blue and i imagined that you’d come with me.
see, the walk was really really long.
but i’d have liked it more if i’d held your hand.
i think the water would have been
something
if you’d laughed as the spray hit our faces.

your name seems to be my edge.
the only reason i’m a bit normal is you.
part of the reason i love is you.
my thoughts hit walls,
push these boundaries.

they were so carefully set up,
but not for you.
you were what i didn’t consider.

i didn’t consider where your name made me go.
i didn’t know how consuming this was.
i didn’t know that every view made me wonder what i would feel,
what i would feel if you were there.

i should be listening to music,
while writing love poems.
but i’m busy,
and all i can manage is a short little note,
about something else.

my mind feels like clean paper today,
fresh and beautiful.
it’s been filled with the brightest colors
-someone telling me i’m beautiful,
loved.
someone loving my words,
someone whispering promises of heaven in a song.

it’s been filled with bright-eyed questions,
running,
but always feeling oh so very right.
i feel oh so very right.

i ignore this small twinge in my gut,
my life is going so well,
that i do not doubt.
but i ignore that small twinge in gut,
when someone said i could be cured.

their face appears everywhere,
and their face is my mother’s inspiration.
does she think i can be cured?

i am the perfect daughter.
i study, i volunteer.
i am happy, i am kind.
i am in clubs. i am good with my friends,
reasonable and responsible.
but there’s a blight she doesn’t know -a blight that is not a disease.
but when your inspiration tells you so, would you dismiss it as an interesting view?
would you believe it if you knew my blight? or would you forget?

i, i can only describe my blight as bright.
i have been told i light, like every color in the world.
for once, i feel right.
i may not fit in, but i know the lines on which i walk.
or i know how to walk.

because you told me, to hear someone who said i was bright.
because you have always supported what i am.