Category: Personal

Poem: Burial ground (true love)

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Poem: Burial ground (true love)

I’m a very kind and gracious girl
If you let me, I will give you the world
But as the brutality of this world continues to unfold
My mirror’s edge is veiled, my patience can’t be sold

Give me your garden
Make everything quiet
I swear I’m prettiest when I’m not lying
I won’t give up hoping, I won’t stop trying
But it would be a piece of fiction to say I don’t dream of dying

You’re laughing at me
My blonde hair blows in the breeze
I will prevail, even though they’re dead-set on bringing long-lasting harm to me
I see through the trees
When I run, you freeze
Collapsing in child’s fables isn’t only for the weak
Take me with you
I want to know what God knows
Don’t be scared of the nighttime
In the darkest hours, I’m most composed

The more you grow up, the smarter you think you are
But in the same circumstances, you always lose yourself
I collect hard-cover books of flowers & death spells
I know all the wonderful roses by their first and last names
I play with my sanity like it’s my favourite win-or-lose game
You were always so harsh
But me? Oh, so tame
Didn’t know how to respond to all the accusations and shame
I hate you, I love you
It all sounded the same

I’ve decided to take my most loved photo of us down from my shelf
I thought it proved we were real
The space between you and myself
But my mitral valve is still broken, so I can’t afford to inconvenience oneself
Though our smiles were true
You said it yourself
Never seen a girl look at you so warm and heartfelt
It hurts now
But it didn’t back then
Those split seconds repeat in my mind, again and again
You were my prince, my most handsome immunogen
You said I stunned in my floral dress
Dainty and parisienne

I know this frail body wasn’t exactly built to please
I’m a young girl too – I have restraint, but I have needs
My singleness of purpose is far too remote
I tend to break up with boys by posting poems I wrote
When I was at my most fragile, I asked you for a rose
Your promises were painful because I never got those

But your perseverance to love me will be your best power
I stay up wondering how to please you
I only sleep a few hours
Me at my most tired is me at my most sour
How much more beautiful do I need to be, in order to receive a white flower?
I’m sort of like a princess stuck at the crown of a tower
My father’s hung flyers for the peasants and princes to form a line
Some of them have courage
Some barely have a spine
The common denominator seems to be they’re all trying
But if you said it’s to impress me, I’d say that you’re lying

Several days ago, I bought roses
To make myself smile
I didn’t change the water
Just like me, they’re dying

Winters in Chicago were when I felt my most free
The wind chill was so strong, I felt it belonged to me
It didn’t matter that it was a lake, I still saw it as the sea
All I remember are evenings at Argo Tea
Feeling happy, just to be me

You must have composure, you must be determined
I’m taking care of myself, I’m doing it on purpose
The December chill confronts me with things I am sure of
Like how spontaneously great heights can collapse
Like how the disillusioned are most likely to relapse
Like how I felt, true love was almost in my grasp

But as the fog on my window, it visited and then passed
It disappeared just like that
I’m trying not to react

I’m screaming into my pillow
(I’m trying not to react)
I’m folding laundry to feel productive
(I’m scared of whom I’ll attract)
I lied to everybody & said I was fine
(I was so scared the whole time)
I’m taking every analeptic
(I write your name, strike it out with a line)

I picture me in your backyard,
Picking grapes off the vine
I cried the whole way home, driving past the coastline
I thought I didn’t deserve beauty, God doesn’t want me on cloud nine
So I hit up your number,
Forgot you were atropine
And now I’m having trouble sleeping because you aren’t my lifeline
I tell you
I need you!
You say, maybe next time
“I’ve got a girl here, she’s helping me escape my mind”

To some people, I’m gorgeous
To you, I’m saccharine
But everything I am, you will always undermine
I’m not your chosen one
Never your valentine

I’m the one that treads water
Looking for reasons to be alive

If you were safety, you wouldn’t give me your hand
You’d sail towards what suits you
The palm trees, the sand

I would get tired
Give up and drown
You wouldn’t say sorry, because you wouldn’t be around

The water obscures my hearing
The green-blue current is the only sound
I wanted to be loved, the void was what I found
But the ocean is my new bliss, so I fade into the background
I’m five again, I’ve found my new playground

I would get tired
Give up and drown
You wouldn’t say sorry, you wouldn’t be around
I’m five again, I’ve found my new playground
The sea has become my chosen burial ground
The green-blue current is the only sound

The void is what I felt, but true love is what I found

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Dedicated to: James Mark Davies.

Poem: A farewell, a goodbye, & a few reasons why

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Poem: A farewell, a goodbye, & a few reasons why

A solid impression
You flourish from attention
I failed to mention
The subtleties in my movements
The delicate imbalance perchance you take me
Miserable, haunting, unwelcoming vacancy
I am the prettiest girl and I would like for you to cradle me

Skin glistening under the simmering hot sun
I think the world of you, but I’m the only one
Your brother laughed on the phone
He didn’t put up with my tone
He said if he has another, why won’t you let him go?
I said, I don’t know
I said, I just don’t know

I know my distress is an inconvenience
I’ve been your soft little lenience
I’m a wet blanket- your pink-nailed, gentle-featured killjoy
You paint yourself gold like it’s your marketing ploy
My hands on your shoulders
“Honey, guns aren’t toys”
The prophet of doom and glory has come to tell us to turn down the noise
We respond, of course, with nothing but poise
Remorse in a bedroom
Withdrawing and sweating
Prepare yourself for the obsolete presence of mind
Tell me the same story you told me last time
In midair suspended, dandelions in my hair
Tell me that you find me graceful and kind
Your catechism can be nonchalantly blamed on the wine
Ice cube crystals melt like glaciers
I think this is goodbye

I’m not profiting from the distance between us
But I am getting closer to reaching the satellite
I rest my head exactly where you used to place yours
Almost every single, individual, starry night
Back then I was a diamond, now I’m back to graphite
It’s your longing gaze that’s such a beautiful sight
A crystalline form of the element carbon
I want to see you take off all that metal armour
Your father said be careful, just please don’t harm her
But changing your old ways is too vain to bother

I thought I could
I stood on the platform
I gave a speech
They hated me
Peered into my compass of female fragility
When my eyes met that of God’s, I could finally see
Nobody in my life ever believed in me
I have only one option and it infuriates me

I have to leave you before you leave me

I’m so deep blue that you can’t see my embers
Think back to my birthday, it was mid-September
You didn’t call
You didn’t remember
And now it’s day seven of this year’s December

And there are no white roses in my room to be found
You love me?
No, it’s the other way around
Coming to terms with that continues to hurt, somehow
I’m constantly deciding whether I can afford to break down
I play in the ocean, wouldn’t mind if I drowned
I just hope I’d be wearing that pink nightgown

I have to leave you before you leave me
I loved you like waves, so wholeheartedly
I think I must do what’s best for me
The walls cave in and bend anonymously
When you close your eyes, I hope you see me
A hopelessly nervous beauty queen
An angel in a dress that makes me feel pretty

The walls cave in
When you close your eyes
I hope you see me

I have to leave you before you leave me

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Poem: Femoral artery (fever dreams)

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Poem: Femoral artery (fever dreams)

I watch you when you’re bad
I take careful notes
I set them on fire and summon gentle ghosts
They won’t scare you or hurt you the most
Nothing like true love taken away, not even close

I’m sixteen in a few days, I’m trapped in this body
I want you to mimic a system like monoclonal antibodies
Feed the hunger
Burn the rage
Set flames to whom I accused you of being
Prove me wrong
Come as a surprise
I’m finding I don’t make the impression that I imply
Sunsets after jazz concerts on the lawn
I try to find stingrays in the ocean when I swim
I think if this life is a fight, then I’ll most likely win
But they’re doing a good job of telling God that I sinned

Like fever dreams
Like soft doeskin
That came from a being you shouldn’t have touched
I wonder at what point will it all be enough
Blew smoke in his face, he tried calling my bluff
I wake up strong, but I wouldn’t say I’m tough
My wrists are so small the cops use child handcuffs
I wish I was making all this stuff up

To live a romantic life is to surrender to passion
With the weather today, I would say it’s not in fashion
Love for me will never be everlasting

I want it to be
I desperately hope
But we always lose the ones we love the most
They hit your bare knees, the cascading blue waves
Make you stay up pacing around for days
I don’t have the time, and I’ve lost my own place
I was so far ahead
I was almost there
I thought I was close
I was almost there
I choked on my insides
I was almost there
I saw my femoral artery
Blood soaked my white underwear

Like fever dreams
Like soft doeskin
That you’ll always regret purchasing because your ex-girlfriend was a vegan and the way she wears pink ribbons in her ash blonde hair makes you go wild
You act like a child
And I wouldn’t even say your advantage was mild
Knock on my door
Stay a while
I’ll only be happy watching you char in the fire

I know the feeling
I know the daze
I know the brilliant, beautiful Autumn haze
I know Fridays spent alone and solitary Sundays
I’ll only respect you if you participate in the chase
And God, I love it when you try to plead your case
You lost the bet
The cops know you
You think you get me, but I don’t believe that’s true
You’re only with her because there’s nothing else to do

Playing with marbles on the carpet, so they don’t roll too far away
I don’t have the time
I’ve lost my own place
But I clean up nice and live my life with grace

You’re lucky I won’t let you see me face-to-face
You won’t forget my brutality for several days
It’s my milk white gentleness that you can’t replace
I used to tell you I love you, but now I’ll rephrase

The kind of girl you wish you had for the holidays
The kind of girl you wish you had for the holidays
The kind of girl you wish you had for the holidays
As vital to the body as acetylcholinesterase

It’s my resilient nature that will get me through this phase
I used to tell you I love you, but now I’ll rephrase

Lilac Dove

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Poem: A hundred drops per second

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When I met you, you hated yourself
Like you were afraid of yourself
As the storms went on,
You found it to be best to be by yourself
And there,
I was,
Watching a man crumble in front of my very timid but sparkling eyes
It was no surprise
You liked salt wounds and touching my inner thighs
But I –
I bask when I wake with the sunrise
And you –
You look down on me for loving everything until it dies
You hate the earth
And you wonder why
It doesn’t pity you back

I moved out, clean new apartment
Living with a friend
I’m working on my craft
No longer at my wit’s end
Looking forward to all the money I’ll spend
Me?
And you?
Will we ever make amends?

I care no longer
I wouldn’t bother
Oh, your poor father
He knows what’s in the water

I care no longer
I wouldn’t bother
Oh, your poor father
He knows what’s in the water

If I were to swim
To you
To build a new continent
I’d turn around
Find a river raft
You think I’m strange and daft
Never read any of my first drafts
Fell out of love just like that

Now you –
Hopefully you’ll remember the words I’ve said
But it no longer matters to me
Whether you’re alive or dead
Instead

Don’t lose your head
It’s not worth it
We were perfect
But we weren’t
And I’m gasping
For thin air like –

A hundred drops per second

©️ Elle Silvestrov

Poem: Anhedonia & daffodils

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I don’t want to write all of these really dark things
It’s just what the anhedonia and isolation brings
I want to be with the daffodils
I want to cry from laughter
I want to bear children
I want to be graceful & filled with poise
But the things that bother me are making so much noise

Glendale Blvd and Union Ave
I read a nice greeting card and thought of you
But you didn’t like my personalized gift
It took weeks to produce
I’m wandering through the aisles of the grocery store picking up fruit
Putting it in my basket to look like I embrace my womanhood
Like my mother thinks I should

Alameda avenue
I’ll walk all over you
Two cigarettes in my hand as I’m walking to Grand
I want to observe the skyscrapers at night
The people that work late
The buildings that keep their lights on
Sometimes the poems I write for you, I sing like a song
I get to thinking that I wish we could just get along
I wish we could just get along

Hoping the rain comes soon so it can hold me
How come when you found out you never told me
I look like I’m texting, but I’m really writing a prologue
To a film I want to make in a silver-blue nightgown
Baby, how do I make that sound

I want to be beautiful in their eyes
But when I’m not, it’s no surprise
I sometimes wonder if I’d prefer the lies
I’d reach out and touch them through their disguise

Come down to downtown with me to find the daffodils
Understand that I’m an addict when I take my pills
Honey, I’m just trying
Honey, I’m just trying
Honey

I’m just trying