I was taking a walk late one night because I couldn't sleep
Just a stroll around the neighborhood as I let my mind wander freely
I walked over to the playground where I used to pretend I was the queen of the world
I sat down on a swing
creeeek creeeek creeeek

Times have changed so drastically since I was young
I've seen four families move in and out of the house next door
I watched the old couple who used to walk their little white dogs disappear
First the dog, then the man
The woman stopped walking, too
The little girls who used to sell Girl Scout cookies from their rusted red wagon grew up and moved away

And that’s when I see her
sitting on her porch swing
gently rocking back and forth
back and forth
with an expression on her face that reads
save me from myself

her eyes, so sad, glisten in the moonlight
her hair
so straight and pale yellow like the straw in the hay bales at festival
cover her tearstained face
her hands
so delicate, yet strong

hunched over a notebook
she scribbles her woes
ink bleeds soul onto the paper
painting the most beautiful picture

a picture of misery and hunger
a picture of betrayal and twisted roads of insolence
a picture of anger and frustration
a collision of colours splashing the pages as she drowns herself
in tears

I take a couple steps back
This girl is so familiar
I know this girl

Might she be me?

Maybe tonight I’ll light a candle
and think of you while it burns
I haven’t done that in a while….
I’m beginning to understand
that we
weren’t meant to be together
but my heart aches for you
I started thinking of all the reasons
you put distance between us
Now I know why
When we were together
it was so hard not to fall in love with the way you smiled when you were nervous
the way you looked at me when you thought I wasn’t looking
the way you would brush my hair out of my face when I was reading in your lap
every time you took my hand in yours
I fell a little bit more into the deep abyss of Love
I know
you felt it too
It was too hard breathing as one
Our Love
wouldn’t go anywhere
You put distance
to protect me
You thought
things would be better
if we just stopped seeing each other
It worked.
But long restless nights I spend
walking along the sandy beaches in the moonlight
I’m reminded of our conversations and the way you held onto my hand just a bit tighter when I said I had to go
and I
miss
you.

This morninng, I woke up to the sun shining down on my face
Like literally, shining down on my face
My bed is beneath a window and my blinds are
always open so I can see the clear blue skies or stormy grey clouds
Nature is kind to me
Today I decided I was going to live and let go
It is summer so let me be free of the papers and test grades and numbers just numbers that I let manipulate me into being a sour, depressed person who hated everything and everyone
Let me walk out in the sunshine, face up towards the sky and out of this dark hole I've been hiding in
I will breathe in the warm air
Let the heat particles dance on my skin like eyes flicker in the light of fire
Here I stand, barefoot with my arms open wide as if to say COME AT ME WORLD, THIS TIME I'M READY FOR YOU!
The wind blows my hair back and dust devils swirl up around me
I will wait for the rain and even when it pours will my heart smile
Let the monsoon storms come down and wash away the remnants of the monster I have become
I will run towards the rainbows and never will I stop
It's summer.

Thank you
To the little girl who kept saying "you can do it" when They didn't think she could do it
To the little girl who believed that thunderstorms meant God was crying but danced in His tears anyways
Thank you to the little girl who woke up one morning and decided she wasn't going to let the world pass her by
To the little girl who followed her older sisters around
You are not a pest.
Thank you for your spirited ways and quiet nature
You know so much more than you let yourself believe.
To the 10 year old girl who looked in the mirror and didn't think anything of her straight black hair, almond shaped eyes, and red puffy lips,
You are beautiful
To the 12 year old girl who thought being smart was bad
Being shallow hurt you so much more
To the 14 year old girl who was afraid of losing her friends
Never apologize for being you.
They left you, it's their loss
Don't find comfort in loneliness it won't work
You need people, stop saying you don't.
Go out and find someone who will bring out the best in you or better yet, find someone who will let you be
You.
Today I say to the girl I was a year ago
I read your journal entries
You're still alive
Thank you.

I've spent many nights Awake when I should be Sleeping
Thinking about You
What happened?

I was looking at Old Photographs the other day
A smile trickled across my face but I wiped it off before the Feelings hit
The smiles on the faces of the people in those pictures
Were they Real?

I'm listening to the same song over and over and over again because I think it will make the pain less painful
But it doesn't

You didn't have to change and yet Change
was Inevitable
Why?

The little girl in the pictures somehow knew who she was
But I know it was a lie
I saw it
the Corruption in her eyes
She didn't know it

I don't remember the day I picked up a pencil and wrote my first poem
I don't remember why I even wanted to write in the first place
But I remember the day I stopped
It was in the third grade
I'd talked about wanting to become a poet the way some kids talked about becoming firefighters or dancers
"You won't make a lot of money"
"Poetry is for old ladies to read when they're sad"
"Poetry is boring"
9 year old me was so naive
I believed them
I was different enough already why attract more negative attention to myself?
So I stopped writing
I didn't pick up a pencil with the intention of writing a poem until about two and a half years later, when we had a unit in language arts on Poetry
We were learning sentence structure
"Welcome to the poetry unit
You're going to write some of your own whilst we discover some of the greats"
At first, they were short haikus and rhyming poems about bunnies
6th grade was when I realised reading poetry was almost as good as writing it
7th grade was when I realised how much I loved it
I realised I could be anyone I wanted in my poems
My poems could be as dark or as light as I wanted them to be
I could pour out my soul onto the pages and the paper wouldn't judge me
8th grade I was scribbling stanzas in the margins of my notebooks
9th grade I found out my poem was being published in a book of student poetry
I've spent summers writing, making up for lost time, writing poetry as I breathe oxygen
I know who I am through poetry
Looking back, I know why she stopped
She thought she was saving herself the humiliation
Looking back, she was pretty wise for a girl her age
I remember the day when my 8th grade teacher told me I was talented
I remember the day she told me to enter that poetry contest
I didn't win
But
I haven't stopped writing
That's a win for me.

It was never easy, for me to say the three words that flew out of your mouth more times a day than I'd ever in my lifetime
I'm not the romantic type
I'm awkward and shy and not one to talk much but you were always there for me when I needed you
I never thought I was worthy of anyone's love, much less yours
I wanted so badly to push you away once we got close but you
You showed me how to trust again
How to love again without getting hurt
I had a fear of heights
I didn't want to fall after you'd pushed me up so far into the sky
I liked the view from where we were
You made everything look so small and my fears
subsided
I still can't say the three words so instead I'll say
Olive You
And I'll hope you understand what I'm trying to get across