Love poem for him: earthquake

Love poem for him: earthquake

You know I stopped myself before I could love you
But
We broke apart
And I can’t help but stare
At your blank, sad face
And the only thing sad about it
Is that you’re not afraid to let me go
You’re not afraid to let

I tried to wake up
But I’m always on the wrong side of the bed
We never got to have that night in the hotel
We never got to have that heavenly first dance
The first and the last pages don’t make me too sad
It’s the way the world turns
Your fingers latched on
Not very tight
Like a blouse that’s unloosened
A foggy memory that never becomes clear

I’m trying to relive the skyscrapers and unraveling chaos
Though all that comes to mind in abstract vision and delusion,
Is you screaming in my direction
Telling me to stop
Telling me to stop
Telling me to stop

What makes you so afraid
To show love to an unloved person
The way you play guitar
It makes me so sad
It makes me so sad
Not for anything do you feel bad
Like grey, fallen embers on a cold winter night
Even though you’d say you’d never
Be there for me
Your sovereignty
Your power

And I remember you
Telling me to stop
Telling me to stop
Telling me to
Telling me to stop

Feeling the things that only I do
The distance that separates me from jagged, carbon you
In ocean waves, we grasp at what feels familiar
What’s underneath us will quench our thirst
Yours, preferably
Mine, isn’t regarded
Unless it’s four in the afternoon & the sun is piercing your nerves
Telling you that these antics are your last fatal curse
I’m far removed
To tell you the truth
I do only the things the boldest among us do

I don’t wait until there’s nothing left to take
In the distance between your brown eyes
And these soft, fallen embers of Victorian blue
Crawl back
Crawl back
Panic attack
Mesh and in pieces
Forgive me for grieving

All ends in love, and love has its reasons
Come find me
Come find me
Come find me
Come find me

It’s so unnerving
Like an earthquake on purpose
It’s so delectable
Like you’ve lost your ability to reason

I’m always portrayed as the one who leaves the throne
Gown is disheveled, porcelain skin intact
Like an earthquake on purpose
Telling me to stop

Feeling the things that only I do
What has become of rage has given its way to you

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Poem: Love it any less

Poem: Love it any less

He tells me
Not to get too excited
As we sit alongside the deep-blue riverbed
But me – I’ve been counting down the days
I saw my chamomile flowers bloom, then close, and fall apart in the duration of one week
As I hadn’t changed the water
I was distracted by the sparkle
Of the morning’s horizon
As it painted me in shades of pink I couldn’t quite capture on film

California outlawed flavoured vape products
I know, I’m mourning it heavily
Now I find myself smoking non-menthol cigarettes in my parking lot
Like my father did, in his
Amber tones of his skin shining like
Diamonds you pick back up from the jewelry store
That line your blue-tinted watch with a brand painted in cursive ink
Like your mother’s Russian handwriting
Soft in all of the
Roughest places

My afternoon gaze is
Thick with gloom and hope, both at the same time
I’m wrapped in my navy ‘Windy City’ sweater that I bought at a Walgreens
Where it took four cashiers to properly ring up my alcoholic drink, too
Because the cashiers were mostly underage
But we were on the same page
Laughing about how liquor makes the turbulent flight go smoothly
And how I’ll wrap myself in bridal magazines and read the new Forbes “thirty under thirty” list
Knowing I won’t make it on there in less than three years
Cutoffs are so harsh, isn’t it maddening
Life is so funny sometimes, at the right times
I’ll fade to November grey like a collapsing sky
I’ll lay my head down and never, ever wonder why
I’ll endure the gradual passage of time

He adjusted his collar
And we laughed about who is taller
Because me, my small frame, I take up so little of space
Though I feel like if I spread my fingertips, they’ll reach the mountains
Surrounded by cherry stems and cascading fountains
Waterfalls along the trail where my senior terrier walks on her own self-created path
My glimmer of hope in this brittle, dark night
Made for a hollow tin of little coloured cards stolen from the paint store
Where we wrote our biggest dreams on
Gathering the courage to set them on fire
And not intending to burn down the park grounds down with our miniature vision boards

I found a poem I published for a boy three years ago
On his birthday
It was called ‘I wrote you a poem’
My mother laughed at how cute that was
I did too
I think back to those years and how he never came through
And somehow that didn’t make me love him any less
Probably even more so

I have to get better with taking derivatives
Along with the vitamins in my medicine cabinet
I finally bought a parking permit for university so I could stop
Getting tickets
Even though the traffic cop is such a sweetheart
He asks about my navy ‘Windy City’ sweater
Things like “so when are you going to finally end up there?”

The piece of rose-tinted, painted card-stock
That I’d never set on flames
I keep it in my wallet
To know that
I’ll get there

I’ll get there
Until I’m at the drugstore again with the cashiers
That are of-age, by that time
And I’m buying wine

And Chicago will treat me like it’s been mine this whole time
And I won’t love it any less
Probably even more so

© Elle Silvestrov

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Free verse poem: Things I’ve found out (the right season)

Things I’ve found out (the right season)

a free verse poem about finding stability & self-acceptance

I know
That things won’t work out as planned
I know that
Because my mother taught me how to be a man
But there are
Parts of me that won’t let someone hold my hand
Because I
Because I
Find graveyards appealing
Harsh winter thunderstorms healing
And the chaos within you is quite often revealing
Of the doom and dismay your surroundings convey
The filth
The agony
The dreams others built for you become destroyed
I’m my own person

But when I drive home at night
I don’t feel alone
I just know I am

It was cold in Chicago
And I wanted to lay down
In the snow
My frail body
Seldom appears melancholy
Singing you songs, breathlessly, to you in your sleep
Though my voice is never the right pitch
Maybe that’s why I wait
Until you hit your steady dream state
An abyss of perpetual ignorance to moral obligations

The impatience
Is testing me
Like a ticking clock
Telling me
I
Haven’t painted
The sky quite right
Haven’t gotten the stars
To my audience’s delight
And I think
I might combust
From the tainted, porcelain figure I often wish to set on fire
Because what burns
Feels so warm
In winter

It’s almost
February
The anniversary of
A thousand slumbers
A rainfall that struck me like
Lightning on the fast lane on the highway
Swerving between cars with my eyes closed
Thinking I’m oh – I’m just so composed
But me, parchment paper thick, practically comatose
Wouldn’t keep anyone up at night
When you haven’t
Made a name
For yourself
And nobody
Gets the intonation
In your full name quite right
Maybe it’s not
The right time
To say

That what burns feels so warm
In winter
My god
The shades of blue
How I’d devour the skyline
Like an arsonist,
I fade to grey
Along with the trembling cityscape

I encapsulate all the seasons & am easily forgotten

I only hope to properly portray
The vacancy light in this hotel I occupy

Me,
Against the wall
Cold, doll-like, confused
Fingertips
Painted the lightest shade of pink that the nail salon could offer me
If only,
I could be elegant
I could like parts of myself that others don’t
I could live my life like
My father envisioned

When he said to me

That I was born
In the perfect season
For a girl who prolongs
Finding a reason
To burn this place down to the ground

Hollow
Cave
Where my old journals remain
Where ex-boyfriends mispronounce my last name
They never remember the best parts of you
They never really knew
How to get through
How your eyes turn dark green when your favourite song comes on
Or when the colour temperature is five thousand Kelvin and
I feel ashamed
That I woke up to find
Myself
Not in embers
But filling a body
With wholeness that only

Real self-acceptance could develop and create

Something permanent
Is never
Found

I’m no good with directions but I don’t believe I’m lost
I’m exactly
On my own two feet
Waiting
To leave a message after the beep

But I hang up, because I remember
They can’t pronounce my last name
The intonation
Is weak
And I
Am so
Much farther than I thought I would be
At this time of my life
Are you, at all, surprised?

When I look
At the cars
Passing me by
On the highway,
I wonder
If they’re going
Somewhere warm and inviting

I don’t know why
That
To me
Feels so terribly frightening

Like a cradle filled with endless lightning

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Love Poem: New York baby doll (cream sweater)

Love Poem: New York baby doll (cream sweater)

The type of girl that you want to meet
And to think that we met on the street
And you watched me tag my website on the grey, electrical box in black sharpie and cursive
For nobody to read, to not bother to glance
And you laughed not at me, but with me
Like we were on amphetamines
Like you aren’t as traffic-stopping, rush-hour-madness gorgeous as you are
How you framed a framework of genuine spirit
And the spirits on your golden side table
And the sweet drinks you made me because you store simple syrup
Little bartender in a black top
With hair like she just left the Manhattan salon
With a smile like she’s been happy all along

I don’t think I ever mentioned it at all
I was just
Struck
By the plants you have arranged on your glass windowsill
The cotton, white, dreamlike, lush bedspread
(I made your bed for you like a hundred times)
I wanted to show you I can perform acts of service
Because I clean when I get nervous

And my god, my dear god
My god, did you make me nervous
But not on purpose
Some people exude a confidence that inspires the same thing in yourself
But there’s still this nervous laughter of
How is she so composed
How is she hardly older than I, and so, so –
Full of experience
Full of delight
Worth talking and laughing from dark to the morning light
If this is fleeting, I can accept that
But some people
You want to know what lets them breathe
And I’ve got your clothes, I’ll give them right back
My New York damsel in sovereignty, too chill to be distressed
I’ll have you at your worst; I’ve already seen you at your best

But I’ll have you at your worst; I’ve already seen you at your best

I hope that you’re happy
I hope you wake up and fall in love with the world
I hope your parents love you
And if they don’t, I hope that in your head you tell them to go fuck themselves but keep them in your prayers every night
You deserve
Confetti streamers on your birthday
Someone to travel on the train for 2.5 hours with 29 golden balloons to
Surprise you with celebration

Something about you is so familiar
Something about you is so new
You looked at me with cocaine eyes when I grew solemn and blue
But I wasn’t tired of you
I was just tired- I was up all night!
This girl’s got a bedtime
And I slept well
But it might be my insecurity, for I can’t tell

If I made the right impression
God, I talked so much
Why’d you make me feel so comfortable!
Why did I have to enjoy your presence!
Under the city street lights when I first glanced in your direction, I thought “my god, she probably has everything”

The first impression
That you made
It is one that may partially come from you, and a portion from the book you lent me
Well, I’ll read it, and all that you highlighted – I love the little shades of blue hue
I’ll learn your secrets
I hope you’re living
A life you dreamt of
I hope to be
Someone you’ll send a message to when you’re
Stuck
Not knowing what to wear,
Bored and want to make me a drink, talk about the weather, don’t even have to think
Want someone to make you laugh about everything
Because I’m good at being that

My New Year’s resolution is to be accepting of myself
So I can stop second-guessing whether others accept me
And start living life as boldly and securely as you appear, you stunning avalanche of a porcelain doll

Think I’m starting to think
This year is going to be new for me
It’s only the seventh, and I’m on my pink bedspread in your cream white sweater
Somehow we’re the same size
Even though you’re smaller
Porcelain and clover, golden and sapphire

And you like luxury the way I do
And you don’t eat animals because you care
And we’re the same age but wiser beyond our years
Even though the boys would never tell us that our face

You’re awfully good at first impressions
Is there anything that I forgot to mention?
Shut up, don’t make fun of me for my apprehension

Make love to me under the twinkling lights
Let me give you directions

Porcelain skin, long princess hair
With plants on your windowsill
Downtown Los Angeles, May earth baby girl of nonchalance & sheer observation

Because being alive is just enough for you
Because being alive comes naturally to you
And you told me, not once- but twice
That you’re happy I’m here too
New York baby doll
You were a star in the fleeting night
While you’re in your studio, I’ll be right here
I’ll be right here
The things you said to me
They meant so much to me to hear

The plants arranged on your windowsill
I can’t wait to tell you their genus and species
Because I like biology
And you like theories
And your projector television screen illuminated a light upon your silhouette that made you look even more like a fever dream

In your cream sweater
I feel much better

So call me if you ever want to chat about the weather

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Free verse poem: Get over it (cream sweater)

Free verse poem: Get over it (cream sweater)

This is one of the shortest poems I’ve ever drafted. Many people think my poetry blocks are separate poems, but they’re actually all one post – I think it’s in being ethnically Russian that makes me so verbose. Sometimes I think I’m entirely composed of words. Enjoy. – Elle

In a cream sweater, I lie polished in the sand
Me, right there, with just the right tan
Your diamond slippers
Soft chain-tainted, frozen and milky bite
Sweet medallion, golden skyline
Treasured and regarded
Held too tight

Never enough
It’s never enough
I’m never enough
Never enough
It’s never enough
I’m never

Like cobblestone paths that I walked along in the summertime
Sweet and concrete
Soft like the horizon
That falls like a ghost, which I warned you about
Not once, twice – not once, many times
Sweet, hazel eyes
Blemished skin
Soothing fireplace memories and lullabies in notebooks
Lined with crisp-white, apricot pages
Laced garments
Torn to pieces
Left for those who traveled never too far away from where they were raised
To lay down forever, at least in the garden
Until the fountain ceases to calculate its own mistakes

Tell me what it is you dream about

I flat iron my hair, and I separate the strands
They fall
I’m beside myself
And I think of diamonds
Gazing at the dandelions on my coffee table
I notice that the table leg is about to come apart

Never enough
It’s never enough
I’m never enough
Never enough
It’s never enough
I’m never

And I, too
Dissolve like the sea

And I, too
Wish you were over me

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