Too many times
you've walked in and out,
contradictory to the
hook line of your persuasive essay
to win me over,
stating that you would
never
leave;
but you're no longer a constant,
no longer the gentle lull of the
waves against the coast
that send me into sleep at night-
rather,
you are the sporadic gusts of wind
pushing open my windows
and blowing in leaves and twigs
that mess everything up.

And you make it hard to say no.
You make it difficult to push
through the current and swim
back to shore,
because your pull on me is too strong
for my own good-
but I love the water,
and I keep going in for a swim
despite the inevitable fate of being
dragged down;
and I would normally swim in other oceans,
but there could be sharks below the surface,
and I don't even know if I could
get myself there.

When I was twelve,
my uncle told me that
when I got older,
I would only have enough
"best friends" to count on
one single hand,
and they would be the
best best friends I'd ever had.

And I can count my five
best friends,
but they are not
my best best.
Because they tug
and twist
and ****
and pull
on my heartstrings
in ways that could make
a grown girl cry;
and they do.

So I can tell you the names
of my best friends
that rip me to shreds
and throw my heart
onto a floor covered in
broken glass;
and you will be able
to identify the names,
because they might be your
best best friends, too.

Wanderlust
the beast to slay them all,
pushing my desire
and reinforcing my disability,
reminding me that I have
nowhere to go
and everything to see

Disorder
in my bedroom,
in my essays,
or in my brain;
all of them causing
someone (me)
to explode in a fit of
unwanted emotions.

Apathy
Towards my schoolwork and
busywork handed to me
by middle-aged "can't-do-so-teach-ers"
that need a handful of capsules
to numb the pull to leave
just as much as I do.

Dysfunction
in my brain's chemical makeup,
and my family's emotional one,
not to mention the relationships
I attempt to handle like a
one-handed juggler.

Imagination
creating scenarios in my heart
that could never come to be,
leaving me in a perpetual state of
disappointment.

So now I will tell
my nieces and nephews,
sons and daughters,
or countless grandchildren
to never trust the ones that
try to make something different
of your heart,
because they don't really love you,
they love what the can make you become.

There's so much to write about you
and so little time,
but that's okay with me,
because if the world knew everything about you,
someone better would come, and you wouldn't be mine
...not that you're mine anyway...
but if you were to come and stay,
not a day would go by
where I wouldn't die
simply to grab your hand
and run away.

But I digress...
When I think about you, my head-
no, my heart-
no, my head-
no, both!-
are a mess,
and I just want you to come in
with your kisses like a broom
and sweep me away to somewhere
better;
somewhere that they can't complain
or attempt to explain
or dictate,
because it's ours alone.

You're in my mind so often that sometimes
it seems so second nature-
so natural,
so factual,
like procrastinating my homework
until 11:58 on a Sunday night,
or making that cup of tea at 2am
that I know will hurt me
more than help me
in the sleeping department.
Your presence is like my two front teeth;
a little worn and chipped
from being around so long,
but a trivial part
of my smile.

And I know that your face goes all squinty
and you close your eyes
when you're laughing really hard,
and it makes my stomach do little flips,
and I laugh along with you
so you think that my smile is
only from the joke;
And I saw you looking at me
while I was reading my book with
a smile on my face,
and I saw you turn your gaze
when our eyes met as I brushed
some hair out of my eyes
so I could see you in my peripherals
just a little bit better.

But the best part of you
and me
is that I wrote this poem with no one in mind
and now
I will fall asleep with your name on my lips
and hidden inside the ink on the page.

Once upon a time, I was five years old,
and it didn't matter that my hair was so short,
that my glasses were big, and my socks would show;
asking questions made you curious and smart,
and your clothes didn't matter, because they'd get ***** anyway.

A few years later, I was eight years old
at a brand new school with a patch on my eye,
so I bought new clothes to make myself stand out;
but the only thing that worked was the one reading eye,
so I stopped being different and I started being quiet.

Another three years, and I was in sixth grade
with the same classmates and a new set of rules
where my clothes mattered more and my brain mattered less;
and the girls didn't like me 'cuz I never spoke up
and the boys all snickered when I tried to make a joke.

Now it is five years later, and I'm sixteen years old,
and most of them from junior high I don't see anymore;
but I still can't take compliments because I don't believe they're true.
After years of believing the ever-spoken phrase, I know that
sticks and stones do break my bones, but words hurt even more.

Is troubled the word that people would use to describe me?
No; but I know that I would.
I am troubled by a constant sinking feeling
coursing throughout my whole body.
No, not sinking.
Drowning.
I tried to drown myself a couple of times when I was younger.
Not to die, just simply to feel it.
There was a burning fire in my lungs
and a resulting ache in my throat,
and my limbs started to go slowly numb
as the light from the top of the water
slowly receded behind my eyelids.

But then, almost against my will,
I went up.
I let myself float back to the surface.
Each time I went back, my life became more of a mess,
and I have always wondered why I couldn't just
drown already.
Just let myself slide down into the calm of the water
Just.
*******.
Drown.

I am drowning though. Every day.
I'm drowning in nothing, and nothing is drowning in me.
Apathy is beginning to take control,
and I'm trying to swim away to loosen its grip,
but it is clinging on and pulling me back down and
drowning me.
Burying me under water and waves,
stealing my breath and making me feel as though
I'm floating through nothing.

So I am a hidden troubled girl;
the feeling and the hurting and the scars
are all tucked away buried nicely underneath
my layer of clothes that no one even wants to take off.

I don't want sympathy--
that has never been my goal.
I do not want unrequited attention all the time,
and I don't want people to think that I'm afraid of being alone,
even though I am.
I don't want anyone to feel sorry for me,
I just want people to know.
I want people to see, and I don't want to lie
and fake
and masquerade
around this tiny ******* town anymore as if
I were the same as
everyone
else.

I am not the girl I seem to be.

I am a troubled girl--
let me be her.

I want to wake up next to you
all wrapped up in your arms
with your heartbeat against mine,
your breath in my ear,
and warm sunshine on blankets
to keep us warm.

I flutter my eyes open
in the hopes that something
will have changed,
but there is nothing new
and everything is dark
despite the early hour.

I stare up at my ceiling
and dream of new surroundings,
because mine are displeasing
and they make me feel
as if I am drowning
in a pool of nothing.

I pull myself out of bed
because I know that I cannot stay
wrapped up in my comforting sheets
for all of eternity.
Because even though I am afraid
there is a whole world of tomorrows.