I recently got back into poetry. I mean writing it. I don’t really like reading all that old-fashioned Emily Dickinson stuff because poetry is like music for me–I’m addicted if I can relate. So, yes, these five bits of poetry are all about relationships of some kind. I think people and relationships and how we interact and small moments of the day and reminiscing are interesting, inspiring, and beautiful, and I tend to get really into it when I write personal bits. If these get a good response, I might post some more tidbits when I write them.
Affection.
The little room is a jewel; a cramped, gross mess, the smell of plants and murky water, the taste of lingering sweat and sun, the aura of Lysol and chalk and awkward feelings.
Your straight hair, freshly cut and too short, showing your laugh lines and deep-set olive eyes; my curly hair, slightly damp and smelling of soap, suffocating my neck, forcing it to push out beads of sweat as I shake the front from my eyes and bite my lip, a smile for you.
We don’t notice the rest much. Only the obviously dirty floor that we occupy.
The cord runs between us, connecting our ears and brains, what we think we know, what we want to find out. It’s frayed and ratty, you make excuses.
One part was in your shirt, but I pulled it out so I could be a part of your thoughts. I take it from your hands and click around. You are sarcastic, but I know you like this exchange, because I like it, too.
I say nothing, just look, and you laugh and ask why. I don’t have an explanation, but maybe it’s because I don’t want to. Because I know you want to know, and I don’t always have to tell you.
For a long time we are like this, inhaling the smells, figuring out each other, mingling, contemplating, remembering, forgetting, repeating.
Unsettled.
I guess this is what you wanted me to say, that you were right. And the times you were wrong were not a mistake.
That when you told me and I cried and you laughed, it was alright.
That I knew that you honestly felt something, even if I didn’t.
I guess you thought I would lie. And it would feel good for us.
The waves crash upon me and your words swallow me whole, but you were right.
For those few moments, I could sacrifice sanity. I could sacrifice myself for what I thought I could gain from you, for what I thought you could give me.
If I hadn’t sacrificed, well, I knew I would. I knew that anything short was unthinkable.
What it would have felt like
For you to turn your heel would be like allowing you to admit you were wrong
A chance I couldn’t take.
I guess I’ll sit here and watch you mock the birds and caress the dirt and carve out our names in the tree that is a runt and will fall at the first howl of wind
I guess that I will say all you want to hear and that I will let you tell me how my hair looked better in an upset bun, mingled with grass. And I will fix it.
When it is Hell, it is worth it. I guess this, too. Or I make it up.
Either way, as long as you are happy. As long as I still have you.
And if you run away, I guess that you will still be right. And the times you were wrong will never be mistakes.
Forever.
I know there’s no such thing, but you made me believe there was.
You brainwashed me with your perfect hair and your lips that were gone as soon as they touched.
Forever: a cloud of intangible perfection
What could be a better promise?
I believed it, too.
I agreed because I always wanted to have you at my fingertips
I never wanted there to be a time that I’d have to be without you.
I’m sure you knew that
So you took me in your arms, repeating forever through the kisses that left before they fell
I fell asleep there,
And when I woke up, forever had come and gone.
Replay.
She presses the play button, a simple action.
The picture moves, the video begins to play and she watches him move. She watches him strum his ukulele; he strums it innocently and easily and his head flows with the rhythm.
She wonders why she was ever so infatuated, why she ever wasted time like this, wonders why he was once her everything as his lips move the words of “Your Love.”
She notices that his hat is not fully on his head, that if he jerks too violently, it may fly off his head and maybe she could catch it.
Maybe she could catch him.
She believes he is singing to her. She believes that it could have been different, had she not been so young and naive. She believes she could have been mature.
She’s screaming now, vicious threats pouring from her dark eyes, blurring her wishes and wondering, screwing his voice into tight knots and throwing balls of sound across the room.
She’s numb as he finishes his song, the ukulele no bigger than the length of his stomach across.
His lips touch together, his small eyes close, his hand reaches for her.
I can’t look at this any longer, she screams, and presses Replay.
Memoirs.
It has only been a day, but you’ve already begun to haunt me
The way I can still remember your words and your hands and your face
The way I can still know what you want, how you feel
This hurts me.
I don’t want to know
I want to go blank, to forget
And I don’t want to cry.
But every time I try this, you’re still there.
Go away.
But you don’t listen.
Little particles of sand and some clear blue glass
Stubby tan fingers and ungraceful toes
A myriad of nothing, a microbe of something
Pouring through and out and back over again
Something crying
Wailing and wanting
Breathing hard and short and silent
Whispering inside of me, telling me who you are
You do not remember how I felt, how I felt you that one Sunday morning
Only us and the crispness of the room, the starkness of the walls
Droplets of light danced and we danced with it, naturally, two people and nothing more
I remember all this and more
So stop trying to tell me what I know
Haunting, do not cry.
Pleasing, do not play.
Melodies of things that can never be again.
