i need to start writing actual poetry again.

i want this so badly.

but it's been decided

and it's known

that nothing

like this

is substantial.

love cannot be based upon mind alone.

i love you.

i just realized that i've always known.

i remember doing the twelve lady bugs dance in dolce's house

i remember the morning pounding at the window

i remember standing in the rain,

wishing that you wouldn't leave me anymore.

i've always known that you will go

or that i will, perhaps.

i say it over and over and over

and it still doesn't change that one day

i

will be without 

you.

and i feel like i'm the only one who does sometimes

(and at others, i know you do too. and i almost wish you didn't because i know the pain.)

everytime i look at you

i'm about to cry.

sometimes i hate myself for leaving.

not just you, but everyone i've ever known.

i used to have this dream when i was little

about us huddling around in a circle in grandma's kitchen

in fairview.

i remember that we had all joined arms- ready to protect ourselves from whatever was about to come, from whatever direction.

perhaps the most memorable part

was when i looked into grandma's purse

and found one of the sesame sticks she used to carry.

she let me have it with a smile.

i don't know why i know this

and i don't know if anyone else

can know like me either.

i just hope i understand soon enough.

poem for english 259

this is alive. 

mouthfuls of cool soil-

contrast to the thirsty grass. 

mounds that seem like mountains,

clay that acts as dish, 

berries that paint, 

moss that becomes a rug. 

self-sustainability seems too large of a concept for a child,

but to the girl that never talked

in your backyard

everything seems possible.

i'm the mayor of this town

and you, yes Maggie, you

need to go collect sticks for our pile.

oh don't ask questions

i just told you what to do.

don't think,

just act.

the girl who never talked 

let the trees speak for her.

the sky has a thousand words to spill, you know,

if only we are willing to catch them.

wittling bamboo shoots

and decoupaging flowers;

(the ones that had fallen of course, or else Mom would be mad)

all pointless activities

that kept

the girl who never talked

busy

so that she wouldn't feel alone.

she has since been replaced.

 

long gone are the k-mart leggings,

the tangled hair,

and the perpetually dirty fingernails.

it's only the tiny handprint

of red mexican clay

on the pristine white door to this world

that tells you she was there.

serendipity is just around the corner.

i'll grab the mittens

that i'll only wear once

and you'll grip the icy steering wheel.

we'll cascade down the 

death trip roads

and sit on park benches

like simon and gafunkel

predicted decades ago.

it's good to have you with us, even if it's just for the day

i'm tired.

oh the exhaustion

of living five lives.

flake.

i'm not even sure if you're what i want anymore.

i do,

but i don't know if you're my forever.

i know that sounds absurd considering that i am eighteen

and that forever is hopefully over sixty years away,

but forevers are the only things that matter

in a sea of happeneds.

keepsake+ til kingdom come

i miss you so much.

you're always within me.

hell, you are me.

but i have so many parts of myself

that i forget how it feels to be certain "me's"

i have the me that bows silently, letting the prayers and love warm her cheeks and soul like a fresh towel resting against a radiator.

i have the me that lies in bed staring up at a breakfast club poster (not behind) and cries, listening to the train and the icy rain- having a strangely firm hold on her life and being confident, but not scared, of what's to come.

i have the me that types away all day cementing the gap that communication has brought, not really understanding the weight of anything she's doing.

i have the me that travels all around, working, learning, smiling, listening and feels guilty because her family can't afford to do the same- they can't afford to live, and i feel guilty because i am.

i have the me that talks to christina endlessly about the things thought about in the room with the dusty blue carpet and the breakfast club poster above the bed.

i have the me that threw girls into the air and caught them, happy to feel the burn and tear of muscles in her arms and legs- elated to see the bruises forming under gingerly-pressing fingertips.

i have the me that drives to panera and swims in the melody of wilco.

i have the me that dreams of a man, a man that all of these poems and words and thoughts and lyrics and sounds will make sense to.

he won't say anything, he'll just know.

but is it possible to find another one with so many me's?

this is the me that i've missed, the me that doesn't have a you.

i'm not sure if i even want you.

i know some of me wants some of you.

but does all of me want all of you?

i need to weight it all.

twenty-six

my name is michelle. i've never really thought about that before.

in twenty-six days i will be nineteen.

how very strange.

i feel so far.