Love, the real kind, is never simple.
It is the one thing that makes life worth it in the end,
and something that wonderful and sought-after is never going to be easy to get.
You have to work for it.
Blood, sweat, and tears.
So if it’s easy, yeah maybe you won’t get broken.
But you won’t be truly happy, either.
You’ll be settling.
Don’t get me wrong,
There are lots of things in life that are totally acceptable to settle on.
Sure, Harvard was your dream school.
But you know what?
Going to your state school because its more affordable
Will still get you where you want to be in life.
And I know the hairdresser couldn't match the color you showed her,
But you are beautiful and can rock it anyway, so don’t worry.
But love?
Settling in love is like buying a pair of shoes that are a size too small,
Just because you thought they were pretty.
They may look nice,
But you are dying on the inside. I
f you had just held out a bit longer,
You would have found a pair just as beautiful that fit well, too.
Maybe that nice guy looks good on paper,
But if he doesn’t give you butterflies whenever he looks at you,
Don’t be with him.
You want someone who makes you fall for them every day,
Not just once.

The butterflies flutter
and you don't see.
Maybe it's because
you're looking through me.

At least let me be
the girl who doodles on her arm
because she's scared to get a real tattoo,
and the girl whose freckles bloom
like little daisies on her cheeks
to match her middle name,
the girl who leans out the window of the car,
to feel the wind kiss her face, her soul,
and the girl who sneaks out early
to write poetry in a French town,
who wears silver rings, not gold,
and sometimes laughs too much,
or too little, because,
this is also the girl
who breaks her own heart too often
because she believes that it's better
to regret what you've said
than what you haven't,
let me be her, because,
without her, I only exist.

She peeks  out
from under her curtain of hair,
watching the world,
unaware.

We want to be remembered.

Is that not why we fold
pieces of gum into
the neat underbellies of tables,
is that not why we stomp up silent stairs,
slam arrogant doors, push back nonchalant chairs?

And is that not why we bury half finished cigarettes,
cherry stained from lips, and ashed
from the careless shakes of wrists?

Or throw empty bottles
as far as reluctant arms allow,
so that satisfying clinks can reassure us
of those other things,
as broken as our lives or sometimes
hearts.

We're afraid to be forgotten.

Every day my cat paws at the back door, yowling to be let out
Every day like clockwork he does this
And every day we let him out

I always find him crouching where the porch meets the grass
Staring out into the distance
He'll do this for hours
Sit at the porch's edge until his wanderlust is quelled
I think he wants to run
I think he wants to leave this place that is all too familiar,
All too comfortable for his wandering heart
I know how he feels
Yearning to run
But not wanting to ***** his paws

Everywhere I turn I encounter folks who seem to have it figured out
(Whatever "it" exactly is)
They appear to know who they are
Oh how lovely that must feel
For I am just a wanderer
I am excellent at nothing but acceptable at most
And that is a confusing state to be in
For how, then, do you find something to be passionate about?
Those who seem so comfortable
Who seem to have it figured out
I envy them, and oh how I long, how I strive to be them
But the more desperately I clutch at the emptiness around me
The further I get from discovering my passion
And the further I sink into loneliness

She is in prison

it is my fault

Society tells her it is
That she, a woman, shouldn't have worn such
A short dress
Shouldn't have been "asking for it"
With her wandering eyes
And coy smile

what is wrong with me

She has come to resent the image she sees reflected back to her each day
It is unrecognizable
foreign
And she finds the sight of it
makes her physically ill

help me

The volumes she speaks through her
pleading eyes
go unnoticed
She is silenced by oppression
her words that push the crease
of her lips
elbowing, shoving, clawing their way out
are swallowed by her fear