3 Poems

[ArtMatters]

1) Untitled

They wanted us to be them, we wanted to be us

Poor them? Poor us!

We never wanted to be raised like them

Trying to be them was never in us

All we wanted was a big sweaty handful of paper

Green paper with printed words…

Words of validation

We cried as they critiqued our every move

Waiting for us to crumble, fumble, and

God forbid.. be real

We waited for the lies

Lies that we were ok just as we were

That we were smart, competent, and capable

That they cared about the things we loved

Or even the people we loved

But when the lies come they multiply

They spread and congeal like disease

And if you get caught up in their web

The only way out

Is one truth at a time

A piece of honesty for the snap of a silky thread

A step closer to freedom, autonomy,

A step closer to authenticity

One step closer to looking in the mirror

With a little less shame,

A little more hope

And a lot more confidence that

You mean something

Are somebody, and can

Be loved.

2) Untitled

I never wanted to be broken

I didn’t ask for it

So stop treating me like I’m doing this to you

Like I’m inconveniencing you!?

I am but an empty vessel thrown out to sea..see?

Searching for pieces of sky

Amongst harrowing waves

Crashing, turning, scraping pieces off of me

With a soft, clear blue, fluid, tongue

Every day a new forecast

Red sky at night, sailors delight

Red sky in the morning sailors warning

But sometimes , here, in the middle of the ocean

Where I’ve ended up

The sky is stained pink all day long

With red dripping and enveloping different parts of the horizon

I wait for the days there’s not a cloud in the sky

And a little sea bird comes

To sit with me on the pieces of my raft

The shambles of what it once was

She pulls me out of loneliness

She has her own frustrations too

This little birdy of mine

She wants to see the world you see

To soar through the vast open sky

And though there is nothing physically keeping her here

An imaginary teather keeps her by my side

I wait for the day she realizes the teather is held down by fear

And flies away from me

To leave me alone here

With my sinking ship

And the sinking feeling of

Loneliness and despair

3) The One

The sun has become my lover

When she leaves I fall terribly ill

I curl up in a ball and wait till dawn

When I can ingest her like a pill

I want to soak up all her light

To rid me of my dark

But when I dare forget she’s there

She’ll leave me with her mark

The clouds will come and cover her,

The rain will follow too

and when night falls she’ll be long gone

and then I’ll be feelin’ blue

I know our loves not easy

and that I share her with more than one

but my baby, she’ll come back for me

when her other work is done

The moon is often jealous

As I loved him once before

But I didn’t mean to hurt him

I just needed something more

He sneaks up on me when night falls

sometimes spies on us in the day

and though I cannot tell him

I still love him, despite what I say

I cannot tell him why I left

For whom, or even when

I can only reassure him he’d be the one

If my now was switched with my then

And thus, I’m left here lonely

Torn between the moon and the sun

Wondering if there’s a third light

I believe some call it ‘the one’

(p.s. not that I'm really worried about it but just a note: I haven't decided if I'm going to do anything with this collection of poems yet so in the meantime I reserve all rights to any shared creative writing or artwork etc on this site blah blah blah lol - practising artists always feel compelled to make statements like this as a just in case measure lol..just better to be safe than sorry)