Poem: One letter sent, one letter kept (lunar crater)

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Poem: One letter sent, one letter kept (lunar crater)

Even the smallest meteorites can make a dent
A shower in the afternoon, music absolutely must play
I can’t give my mind too much space
Tried to hate you, but the action is impossible for me
A sensitive, contemplative queen
Take inspiration from the female main character on my television screen

Dying to spend time outdoors
Perfect place to talk with you
Where nobody can yell
Keep up appearances, keep moving forward
Naturally, I’d be stopping to take photographs of plants
Though I am truly interested to hear how you draft
Your words so carefully and yet,
They still hurt
My own oblivion—how unusual; it’s a first
Why people search for someone to take accountability
Finally makes perfect sense to me
It would mean everything
Though I have no expectations
Now that’s truly uncharacteristic of me

Poem: One letter sent, one letter kept (lunar crater) [continued]

Hold myself close
Hold myself close
Favourite Radiohead song for when I’m depleted
Not what I wanted, perhaps what I needed
To relate to how people in certain circumstances feel
I don’t like it
But I’m committed
To better understand the world
I want fresh florals and my favourite perfume
The sunshine is out there for those that feel consumed
By hospital bills and mental notes
It’s precious, our time, so I’d like to enjoy it
But we’ll never move on if we don’t address it
Neither the one affected nor the one who bears it

It’s shared, can’t you see?
I believe in harmony
Have learned I can never convince somebody to promise me
It’s better like that
The effort sure does count
I’m seeing blue
I think of you

Poem: One letter sent, one letter kept (lunar crater) [continued]

I’m in a gown, I’m ready
The water can take me
Reshape me
She only writes this much when her heart is breaking
Turning hobbies into routines
Cut-outs from magazines I’m framing
Made me feel ill, vomit on a television screen
The way you talk to me
It feels so mean
Your absolute favourite colour is also one of mine
Sage green

Don’t be dramatic
It’s just television static
None of it truly qualifies as far-fetched or theatric
You said there’d be plenty of room
For me
In the dusty attic
I looked for my favourite pen and a piece of A4-lined paper
My words had a breathtaking honesty that made me proud of myself
Celestial equator, vintage coffee maker
Elegant movie-maker
Pretty little lunar crater

One letter sent
One letter kept
If things change, it could be a new beginning
If they don’t, I’ll begin anyway
The sunshine is out there
For those that feel like running away
But once the meteorite hits,
A lunar crater forms
Prettiest thing I think I have ever seen
True harmony

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Love poem: Charcoal-stained t-shirts on porcelain skin

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Love poem: Charcoal-stained t-shirts on porcelain skin

To a home I don’t want to come back to
I have been feeling this stifling feeling of wanting to get away, to get away
But I don’t run away from my responsibilities
Something to be proud of
Dad, did you see that, all of these times, from wherever you have been relocated to
If there is a Lord, they are a God—genderless, liquid, solid, vaporous substance
Never parasitic
Always appreciative
Who you are, where you came from
They don’t see that in you
The people in your surroundings, the ones that make such
Wild accusations, to my peril it used to be
Until I found a form of insanity
That blanketed me in a comfort I truly feel is finally real

I must sound crazy to you
All of this I’m so aware of that I think it’s started to crack my skin apart
In tiny little precious spiderwebs
I collect
In a drawer beneath my queen-size bed
I collect all of my tiny, little, precious memories

Love poem: Charcoal-stained t-shirts on porcelain skin (continued)

Have come to realize that being blanketed in softness
Makes life feel finer than operating in a self-isolated cave
But I feel deprived of a human spirit
Perhaps it’s too much for me to think about, yet I still do
It’s not overthinking if I’m hit with the infinite branches of how deeply in love I am with you

Never want what I can’t have
I make my palette worthwhile if I’m going to move at all
It has to be at a target
As of late, it’s been moving at a frightening speed
Take my physics equations and calculate
How I could throw the baseball in such a way that it would land in my teammate’s glove
Belief in others
A steadfast, full-depth, incisive belief in others
Some of which I’ve had to let go personally
But never universally
Everybody deserves to feel half of the things I feel when I’m next to you

Love poem: Charcoal-stained t-shirts on porcelain skin (continued)

Typing this on a plane—carefully arranged composure
Your black Vans
How you don’t crash out when faced with shoelaces
They always end up bound in knots when I go to untie them
Can’t really figure out what’s wrong with me
You fixed it immediately
Fortunately for me, nobody can fix another human being
Finally evaded the line of thinking that the opposite could come true for me

If I am shattered glass, I just want somebody who comes
Prepared
Unafraid
Careful but not conscious
My eyes have started producing tears as of late—the dryness has resolved
I think about how I feel and immediately regain my composure
Charcoal-stained t-shirts from the clearance section
You said they looked good in relation to my skin
If I didn’t know it yet, my goodness, I’d have figured it out right then

Love poem: Charcoal-stained t-shirts on porcelain skin (continued)

Prepared
Unafraid
I know I can handle this
Haven’t felt it in so long
It’s been years since
I have felt
Like crying from joy when seeing a human being that is in my life
Not a musician,
Not a family member that will forever mean the world to me
Just a boy
Wearing black Vans
Shoelaces that perfectly untie
I wish I could watch our entire story on rewind

I won’t get lost this time
Priorities won’t shift
I’ll dance in my bedroom and my lifted pickup truck while I drive
Hug my children (the dogs)
Take care of things I’ve never dealt with for my mother
I’ll be alright
I won’t get lost in time
Wish I could watch our story on rewind
Go back to the very first night
I’d say, hi
Everything would turn out the same in the end
Me, on this plane
Wiping tears away, and you know it’s because I’m writing
Have no clue
Think I’m processing my stress
I’m not stressed about you
I’m miserable to be so happily in love with someone who

I could have been better to.

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Poem: 77 in

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Poem: 77 in
cinematic, eerie tenderness

There, concrete bridge
Throwing up like a landmine
Shocked to the brim
Might let you in

You—there for “support”
Always following me
Wherever I turn up
Scared for me
Budget B-movies
Film star queen
The things in-between
Get me out of this serene dream

Poem: 77 in [continued]

Them, rotten toys
Making all of this devouring noise
Unedited, spherical bends of water
Shriveling cold beats
Turn up the heat
To do away with, that’s a fact
Or a vision—to destroy
Our friends we’ll employ
If we have any left by then

You, not forgotten in the least
Leather jacket, cold-hearted beast
Pockets so deep I put my hand inside
And I leave it inside
It’s comfort I find
Ask how many inches tall you are
No matter the answer, it’s still up far
But with my hand in your pocket, I smile
That little girl smile, you know
It’s comfort I find, you know

Maybe one day it’ll start to show

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Love poem: Grocery store

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Love poem: Grocery store

West Dale
Palms boulevard
Clover avenue
I go to the grocery store
And I run right into you
Ask me how things are back home
Do your days ever feel terribly long
I say, I have to go
Think I know the place where I belong

Hollywood, Los Angeles at dusk
Her perfume smelled like camellias that bloom in November
They look just like roses, so naturally I’m obsessed
Swing the door open to a settled fire,
Capture in my hands: tiny, soft embers
Collapsing into moonlight, but
Cradled like dust
I’ll be strong for both of us
If I must

Love poem: Grocery store [continued]

You have to feed your nostalgia sometimes
It’s really the only way that you’ll survive
It’s how you keep the dreams alive
It’s the only way they’ll see you on the other side

West Dale
Palms boulevard
Clover avenue
When I go to the grocery store
I always look for you

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Poem: Sitting by the fire (happy birthday)

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Poem: Sitting by the fire (happy birthday)

You know, we grew up with nothing
I found such obscurities so luxurious
My life was so simple
Eerily simple
Because every wrong turn meant
More chaos
Bewilderment
Not the delicate kind
But fine for my patient mind

Driving a lifted pickup truck has changed who I am
It made me more myself than I ever knew before.
I’ve become real acquainted with different types of screwdrivers.
And I remember when my daddy would hot-wire all the cars on the street
That didn’t stop him from feeling absolutely everything
Cross necklace on my clavicle to remind me of what that means to me

Poem: Sitting by the fire (happy birthday) [continued]

As the sun was setting after I exited the nail salon,
I saw four separate chemtrails moving in cable-thin directions,
Combusting as a whole constellation.
I’m in love with my dark, dark, dark green eyes

Drove down Venice Boulevard, and it reminded me of being thirteen,
When everyone my age made fun of me,
but my father insisted that I was a queen
And that to me held much more meaning

Trying to buy sour patch at the liquor store, but they’d kicked me out cause I didn’t have
Proper identification
Now I find myself in my new life and I’m feeling so
Impatient.
Because this life isn’t going as planned and I have to switch gears
I’ll tell you all about it,
But each passing day I find myself facing new fears.
For you
And myself, too!
Because that’s what I do.

Poem: Sitting by the fire (happy birthday) [continued]

Curled up in a blanket,
Watching television and drinking tea
While upper-class people go on holiday,
I just be where I be.

I’ve got a smile so warm we don’t need a fireplace

& I miss the long summer days
Biking throughout our small town
My dad beside me, laughing, as I swam against the
Current of the waves
Making sure I didn’t drown
I know it in my being that he is still around
Like the lights descending from the helicopter
When I’m taking photographs of downtown

Poem: Sitting by the fire (happy birthday) [continued]

I miss quiet times with tea
Ukrainian pears that are overwhelmingly sweet
And if you get close to me,
You’ll have to bear with me
Because I see beauty in absolutely everything.

Like a rocket ship constructed out of Legos,
I’ll be there if anything were to break
The vibrant sunlight hitting my retinas while I’m driving,
I’ve fully realized this is my life to make.

I don’t take for granted
That people don’t offer second chances
But I’m forgiving like an animal that knows you didn’t mean it

Poem: Sitting by the fire (happy birthday) [continued]

And I mean it

I love
Absolutely
Everything
The fiber of my being
The freedom inherent in walking
Around a small town that was yours and now it’s become

A breeding ground for memories
That I will never let go.

Happy birthday, dad
You were so warm we didn’t need a
Fireplace

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