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
Nuclear envelopes A testable hypothesis Will you still love me if I – Will you drown me out Like the noise in a soundproof room He always said he’d like to go to solitary confinement just to get away For a honeymoon
Light leaks Asparagine and leucine Convoluted sighs and my pink floor-length satin dress Eating three times on Mondays, Eating four times, the day after Consuming enough carbohydrates to be like a plant A prisoner in your gardener A wide-awake blooming orchid Couch that fell from a truck bed onto the motorway We could just make it ours Watch the fires and fireflies swarm in the distance Devouring apricots A routine for my bedtime
Poem: Ant colony (birthday balloons) [continued]
Letting go of lethargic tendencies But I don’t have the energy I’m miserable, with or without you Have to be the writer of my own memoir, the heroine in my own maladaptive daydreams That serve me quite well Like soft serve by the beach Made from plant-based oat milk & Oreos I’ll let the sea and the sun and the sky devour me, so I can merge with the ants and Worry only about my colony What a dream it’s becoming
Empty head Empty thoughts Your Percocet My writer’s block I’ve been too, afraid, to put this down on paper A typewriter with no keys Hands that swell Knees that bleed I know perfectly well That I’m who you need Will you be there for me, in the daylight and the evenings? My handsome prince Tread carefully I’m exactly who I aspire to be
Poem: Ant colony (birthday balloons) [continued]
I believe in myself, most of all Though, the cognitive dissonance gets swept like ashes At a fireplace Melting, blurring a reality that you swore was three-dimensional You vase of a porcelain starlit galaxy You atmospheric void, claustrophobic from your own apprehension I’m so in love with every part of you Especially the pieces you really disdain
I’ll take them in my hands Like the softest of sand
Poem: Ant colony (birthday balloons) [continued]
I don’t know what to do with all these birthday balloons The vinyl you bought me, thank you, by the way You precious thing. And the things I have to move on from Tangled in grief-ridden spiderwebs Merging through lanes with my blinker forever on I follow all the laws When the crows are watching, carefully
I’ll let the sea and the sun and the sky devour me, so I can merge with the ants and Worry only about my colony What a dream it’s becoming
Suddenly The impetus is on me To be perfect, so perfect, for you again Satin & lavender bedsheets Fresh clothes from the dryer Neurons that synapse when the clock resets
But I can’t Withstand Dissonance I can’t Bear to Live with regret I can’t Break free from This tangled fishnet The wire digging its claws directly into my spine
Disengagement when separated Disregarded how you said maybe Perhaps it’s my own agenda that I failed to write out in black ink My own handwriting looks foreign to me The flowers in my apartment have finished dying I closed the curtains, but someone is waiting To see me burn out like I’ve been on fire this whole time
Carving my name into my solitude Changing the location of a confined venue I don’t like this dress Don’t like how I look in it Want you to tell me I inspire you to stop playing make-believe Wish you would bring me roses & be gentle with me Not let me lose any more sleep
I’m not really writing I’m scared of defining How lazy I’ve gotten at building my self-esteem The ships are all sinking The pilot keeps blinking & the leftovers have spoiled because real things are only real in real time
So I hit “unsend” Spend the afternoon in my garden Playing with my own hair, saying your name to myself
I can’t even ask you What you meant when you said nothing Because I know myself to get in the way of what could be
I’ll trace my ashes In long cylinder glasses Faking a proof-of-concept of a girl who takes pride in the way she carries herself
Now I’m scared of writing Because I don’t like what I see And that holds far too much meaning to me
I’m sick of trying To act like I haven’t been Crying myself to sleep
Tell me I’m perfect Say that you missed me Step into my four-chambered studio where the pianos lack keys & the guitars have no strings We can dissolve into anything we want life to be
Tell me you missed me Without lying to me Tell me I’m perfect Because you can see how I dream Tell me you loved how I didn’t seem desperate To find in my own self what you’ve found in yours
I’ll rearrange my bedroom Work on shifting my patterns So that the stillness in your settings can bleed into me
Tell me I’m perfect Without lying to me Reach for me when I’m drowning In my make-believe sea Allow me to realize there’s more to let go of More in life to make sense of More in this life to see
When you’ve regained stability Found blue-green lakes filled with clarity Then, you can come back to me
I’ll be in my garden Telling myself That I don’t have to be perfect to be something real
