When I was
20
I became
involved with
a married woman.
She said that
her husband was
abusive.
She was looking
for a way out
or a break.

She had the
most amazing eyes.
Wild and dark,
like a walnut, on fire.
She smelled like
the earth, sweat,
and wildflowers.
There was something
uncaged about her.

I was young
and naive.
I believed everything
and hoped too much.

The *** was
ferocious.
She taught me a lot.
We broke the
bed and took
bubble baths together.
It was a lavender love.

One day, she came
home with a balloon and
flowers.
She said we are
having a baby.
Those wild
eyes flashed pure joy.

My mom was
worried.
"She has a husband."
My mother was a realist.
She accepted it though,
even bought the woman
some gifts.

It didn't take long for
Amber to show a side
of her, I hadn't seen.
I caught her in some
small lies, and she became
violent when upset.

The affair ended.
She went back to
her husband.
It felt like my heart was
being
ripped out through
my nose.
Pain like a
rotting *****.

I remember talking to
a friend about it on
the phone,
pausing to *****.
It hurt so
******* bad.

Her sister called
me a week after
the split.
I asked about the
pregnancy.
It was all a lie.
She had a
hysterectomy a few
years earlier.

I still believe in people,
and hope too much,
and the years have made
me wiser.

I heard much
later that
she died at 40 of
lung cancer.
Those beautiful dark
eyes finally got
some rest.

Support from the soil,
Desire to reach the sun first,
What makes a tree grow?

In the mirror through tears, i notice that i am dressed in the scars of every deep wound I played off like a paper cut, and the phone in my pocket weighs a thousand pounds from your text messages.

I want to skip the ******* thing in a river.

Oil and water but just as much as I know we won’t ever mix, you convince me it’s all part of the recipe.

I have shrank down, cut pieces of myself like a cake and served everyone at every table a slice every time.

Stuffed my baggage in the closet and let you move yours in instead.

Cried like an anxious dog who’s owner wasn’t around.

And we called this pain love, for 20 years.

I slipped into the role, thanks to my parents.

Mentally ill and emotionally unaware,
It’s so easy to choose what’s easy and so hard to notice your love has gone rotten.

I changed my perspective and every smooth word started to sting.

I was kind as you were building up pieces of me to fuel your own fire.

I understood until I couldn’t anymore, but you never would.

Change your perspective with me, climb the mountain and realize the hike’s easier on the way down, i would’ve carried you all the way up if you asked me. But we sat for 20 years and heard everybody on the way back down talk about the view.

I chose to sit with you instead. And when I finally took that first step up, I should’ve known it meant leaving you behind me.

I am my own destiny. I am the bullet in the chamber and the consequences of the trigger pull. I am my own mind, I tended the garden of fear and worry and constant replay of mistakes and regret. I am more than who I think I should be for anyone else.


good luck with all the **** you’ve got going on. disrespectfully yours, your ex “best friend”

An oyster’s grit accumulating
new layers of aragonite
and calcite, contributing, plating
the growing bright translucent white
and crystalizing hard, pellucid
wan pearl – that forms within the mucid
molluscan slimy dank inside –
a creamy gem is calcified.

Diaphanous and lustrous jewel
or septic and necrotic stone
that’s like a canker which has grown
into an opulent fat spherule?
A pearl forms round a piece of grit,
my childhood at the heart of it.

Tender life’s first cry
In a world so pure and new,  
Hello, little one.

Curious minds play,  
Running around the playground,  
Reaching for the sky.

Reading books piled high,  
Through learning they find their way,  
As knowledge is found.

Late nights, coffee cups,  
Graduating with honour,
Live, learn and begin.

Choices weave their paths,  
With responsibilities,  
As coin slips through hands.

A chance encounter,
Draws hearts that grow together,
I love you always.

Two hearts bound with rings,  
Promises in whispered vows,  
‘Til death do we part.

A mother is born,
A new baby greets this world,
They seize my whole heart.

The world keeps turning,
Children into adults grow
With aged threads of time.

Hold my weary hand,  
My journey finds its end now,  
Stars await my soul.

©️Lizzie Bevis

In a nook of an old stone church
a cherub basks in the vesper light —
A childlike innocence for which I’ve searched
that seems to slip into the onset of night.
Fade not away, you sweet dear boy
and never lose your childlike joy —
Fight, fight
the snares of twilight

I started building my house when I was five

Copying the words some pastor told me to say

I already had the foundation laid for me

But that was when it turned to concrete

Or so I thought



Slowly but surely the walls rose,

But they were built of twisted metal

Firm at first

But slowly it crumbles.



The roof is built, supposed to feel safe

But at this point it smothers me

In a house that is not my own

It is full of lies and deceit

It does not feel safe.



Then somewhere along the time,  

The hammers building turn to sledgehammers

Ripping down my walls

Revealing the carnage through the haze

I walk out, and walk away.



The freedom feels strange.

New words on my lips,

Ones I shudder to think of now.

I knew it wouldn’t last

But I wasn’t ready to return



But then music.

A single album, two friends.

Help lead me back down the path to the wreckage of my house

I know it is not all bad.

An intact siding here, a piece of tile there.

I collect the pieces I can still use

And I move to another spot.

I start to rebuild.



I still have questions about my faith, I’ll admit.

Sometimes I forget I’m not the only one I can depend on anymore.

But that’s normal.

I’m learning.

And I have people with me,

Visiting me and helping me rebuild.

I won’t lie and say it wasn’t hard.

But I’m proud of how far I’ve come.

In my journey of faith.