Her wide rim glasses gave her away.
Long white hair and a soft face,
a wide contrast from the one
I was expecting.
Though they both held the
permanently risen eyebrows,
a sure sign of a poet,
She wasn't the laureate
with the short hair and daring face.

She told stories of trespassing.
She spoke as though
her life was that of an adventurer,
convincing us through
clever thoughts and rhyming words.

I listened,
almost unsure because I was
waiting for Star,
Not realizing I was missing one.

She likes trains.
I learned this because she was trying to fill up her five minutes.

She seemed unsure
but her stories told otherwise.
She spoke of marble bridges and Finland colours,
Enchanting enough that I didn't learn her name until afterwards.

Margret.

An English teacher
unafraid of rambling,
but terrified of going over time.

The stars mean so much to me because they put the universe in my hands and beg me to alter it.

They're the only company known,
while the world sleeps, and I can't.

What an incredible experience it is to see your world at rest, riddled with the pain of knowing you can't join them.

Every step I took was controlled.
I had to resist sprinting,
my life on my tail.
I'd taken a quiet road,
begging something to happen.
Anything.
I knew I couldn't run from this,
(and really I just needed something to run from)
but the road was open
they'd never find me
though it left marks in the air,
they couldn't track my breath
and there was nothing else to track.
I could have left.

I don't care about being famous.
A well-known life isn't necessarily
a better one.
The one thing I do care about,
is lack of normality

I wish this life was enough for me
but it's not

every empty road calls to me
like a lover left behind
every day,
like an opportunity lost

I need adventure so badly it hurts,
and I wonder if I got it,
if I'd stop sitting on cliffs
while I contemplated what it would feel like to fall
what the wind rushing over my silver hair would feel like,
whether or not it would be worth it

I've contemplated death because it holds more potential than my life.

I understand that I shouldn't.
But on more than one occasion,
I've stood with the intention to fall.

I've walked on roads
with an intention to run.

I live every day in dread of having nothing to fight.
I've been cursed with such an easy life, when I was born with a fighting soul.

A wave of sadness
hit the city this week.
For the first time in a while,
everything was unbearable.
It was almost like there was a death
of a person we all knew,
affecting all our lives
and leaving us dead inside.
Like the God of liveliness
gave up on us for a week
leaving us to fight against the
lack of light on our side.
Smiles, real or fake,
never reached our eyes
resulting in quiet empty looks
like we had lost the will to thrive.
Probably because we had.

Out of every one of you
who broke my heart
there was one
where I broke yours
first.

There was a time,
when I would have spent
my last day,
leaving my mark on your
unkissed lips
and tracing every line on your hands
with my own.

There was a time
when every moment of every day,
you were on my mind.

I thought I loved you.
I was wrong.

And I know we're young
and prone to puppy love,
and yet it felt so real.

For a time,
you were my everything.
I thought you were the
spark in my eyes,
and the power behind my words.

I believed the very stars themselves
would seem dim
in comparison to our light,
and the world would bend
in our linked hands.

And then I changed.

I've never told you
what really happened,
And now I probably never will.

I felt,
like my entire purpose in life
was to make other people happy
and I wasn't doing a good job.

This isn't an apology,
I've offered enough of those
and honestly
I'm not sorry anymore.

It's more of a lamenting ballad
Recalling the time
I thought I loved you

I couldn't care less about
"Inspirational Quotes"
I don't need to be told that
the present is a gift
or what the best thing about
rock bottom is
or that only I can stop forest fires.

If I was to write one myself,
it would have less to do with
landing in the stars,
and more to do with
how much better you could see them
if you had the eyes of an octopus.

See,
Octopi have such phenomenal eyes.
The spectrum of color they see
makes our own look like
the ****** box of crayons
you get at a kids restaurant.
Whereas an octopuses,
would be the beautiful,
64 Crayola pack
I always wanted as a kid.

If I ever went blind,
I think I'd get octopus eye replacements.
And yeah,
I'd probably look weird because
they'd be too big for my head
but can you imagine how
strange and incredible
it would be?
And it wouldn't matter how I look because
how I see things
is more important to me
than how I'm seen.

If there was even the
slightest chance,
of seeing though the
eyes of an octopus,
that's reason enough to be alive.

And if I could take your life
or your perspective,
and change it even a bit,
that's reason enough too.

So look through the
eyes of an octopus.

Can you imagine the stars?

Cancer.
Carcinoma.
Unintentional cellular suic*de.
All just different ways to say
I'm dying.

They say we fought a battle.
They say we died valiantly.
And once "they" stop talking,
I'd tell them it's more like
we were drafted into a room
where we were forced to put
guns against our heads
and play Russian Roulette
while doctors say
THESE ARE YOUR ODDS.
BEAT THEM.
We learn it's harder
to shoot a gun
while doctors play darts
on our arms.
We learn there's no such thing
as an
empty gun.

Sometimes I feel like I'd have
a better chance surviving
a car crash.
And I cry with my mom
because we both know she'll
survive the backlash.

Now I know you'll have no reason to.
I'll be another
name on a list
another
body, six feet under.

But of all the things about me,
my name is what I hope you remember the least.
But if that's what tethers you
to my memory,
promise me

you'll say my name

and remember.

Dear people-who-think-global-warming-is-not-a-thing,

You have eyes, right?
You're just not using them?
Because I can open your eyes,
but I can't give you new ones.
But either way, you have ears
so listen up
because I'm going to tell you
why you're wrong.

For one,
this is a scientific issue,
not a political one.
It's not something
that can be debated.
Fact
not
Fiction

Now that's out of the way,
here's the numbers:

Throughout the entire human history,
carbon dioxide levels have
NEVER
been above 300 p.p.m.
(parts per million)
What to know where it's at now?
400 p.p.m.
On the scale of things...
Let's just say we're *******.

That's not enough for you?
I'm just getting started.
Sea levels around our lovely planet
have risen 8 inches
In the last hundred years.
Know what else?
NASA says that,
"The rate of the last two decades, however, is nearly double that of the last century."


Also,
You know Stephan Hawking?
The really smart guy?
Yeah, he says you're wrong,
so...

So this is me
begging you
to open your BEAUTIFUL eyes
(I thought maybe flattery would help)
to this disastrous situation.
It's not my imagination,
It's the end of our civilization.



Sincerely, The Environmentalists

I wish.
More than anything,
I wish.

Because no matter
how hard I work,
how long I love,
how truly I write,

it's not enough.

Because the poet doesn't get a
happily ever after.

We get a tortured existence,
a few words to say about it,
and an end.