It is becoming
So hard to be that monster
That people admire
Like watching a Trainwreck
Which gives the simple
Something to talk about
And getting older
Makes it more difficult
By the day
I have rendered myself so frail
Fighting a young man's war
Without the concern
Of becoming the old man
Who calls the shots
I fill with worry
That when that beast dies
Because I can no longer maintain him
No one will love
who I actually am
As I wonder
If anyone
Actually ever knew

There's a storm inside me
it starts every time I hear your laughter in the night,
when I think about the way we changed
from human beings
to some people who can only share
some words written on a cold page;

it's hard to explain how is it that I miss you
when I've never really had you in the first place
and you wouldn't understand
you see
your heart has long forgotten about feelings like these.

still

I hear your voice calling my name
I see you before my eyes
even in my dreams I write you in bleeding lines
and in my waking hours
your smile brings raindrops in my coffee
and tears on the shirt I wear
because once you said that you liked it;


spring brings tulips at my doorstep
but it's hard to feel their perfume
to let their scent in my broken lungs;

people tell me that all I have to do
is breathe



but it's hard to breathe without crying.

i want to take a vacuum to my soul to rid myself of you
you're in my nooks and crannies
hiding from my efforts
no matter how hard i work you'll still be there
constantly driving my compulsive mind to the edge
maybe i don't want to vacuum you all the way gone but i want to rid myself of the pain i feel when you are not here
i can't decide whats worse
the pain when you're gone or the pain i feel when you are here
i'm so needy
i'm so clingy
cut me off so i can heal myself in pity and self loathing
release me from your grip that you didn't even know you had on me
please

On a distant summer
a girl walked four miles
to sell fruits at the haat
and mowed by the May heat
fell asleep on a patch of concrete.

The noon dusts played around her
sleep little girl rest your feet
the winds will play you a song
refresh you with dreams so sweet
the walk back home won't be long.

The sun had slid the shadows grown
when opened her dream dazed eyes
there she was at the haat all alone
her fruits in the basket had dried.

She had dreamed a round dime
clutched in her palm
colored gold with her wish

she had slept thru the time
and when the winds calmed
held nothing to buy home a fish.

Time has flown those dusts far away
years have grown her wise
yet when the winds blow lonely in May
her tears she cannot disguise.

if every year of my life
were a chapter
and I could only remove one
from my story:
I would tear out chapter 14.

I would rip all the pages,
mutilate beyond repair,
shred. Shred shred shred
burn burn burn until
nothing was left but ashes.

14, when I was naive.
14, when I thought kissing a boy
would make even me think that I
was straight, 14
when a hot summer event suddenly
burned me hotter than the sun
ever could, because
at 14, a boy I called friend
didn’t listen.

14, he’s in my house,
14, he’s in my room,
14, he’s on top of me,
14, he’s forcing his way in me and I…
I am telling him to stop.

14, my cries go ignored,
14, he’s stronger than me,
14, my parents aren’t home,
14, I didn’t tell anyone he was coming,
14, he could hurt me if I run,
14…where would I even run to?

Shame; Shame because 14
is the story of when I said stop…
and then stopped trying to stop
what I wanted to stop and had asked
for to stop in the first place but
he did not listen to the word
‘stop.’

14, when fear paralyzed me.
14, when what was less than an hour
felt like a lifetime. 14
was crying when he finally left,
14 was seeing blood and knowing
it wasn’t my menstrual cycle.
14 was when my whole life
changed.

In chapter 14 I had innocence
stolen. In 14 I started high school;
where I had two classes with him
everyday.

14 was acting like it was fine,
I was fine, it was all fine,
until it wasn’t, and
14 was police reports and questions
and being accused of lying,
14 was “He’ll get what’s coming to him.”
But we are chapters away from that now and
justice has never once been applied, and
he roams free and
I still feel trapped under his body.

Chapter 14 would be entitled
“****”
and I would erase it from my story
if only such an action
were possible.

(d.d.b)