Tuesday, March 12, 2013

stuck on repeat

they expect her to be beautiful
they expect her to be perfect
they expect her to be happy
they expect her to fine.

but she isn’t.

she screams and they can’t hear her
because they are blinded by the fake smiles that she
plasters on every morning when she wakes
from the nightmares that cripple her, the nightmares that
are her life.

she sees every bad thing;
every mistake and every bad decision,
every situation and every bad thing that she has ever seen,
in every dream.

some nights she dreams of the blood, blood
flowing from her wrists without stopping and the darkness
that held her in its grasp until her father’s hands found hers
and pulled her back,
gasping with the pain and feeling the tears from her mother’s eyes
falling on her cheeks.

and other nights she dreams of him falling, falling
down to the ground in front of her
because he had sat in his walker and they had been joking
and he told her to push him, but the brakes were on and she didn’t
know and she couldn’t do anything as he fell back
with eyes wide to the ground and didn’t move,
wouldn’t respond to her and when the EMTs finally got there
and lifted him from the ground she could see the pool of blood
staining the sidewalk where his head had been.

once in awhile she gets nights that are empty, empty
and dark and she is nothing because in those nights
she doesn’t exist anymore and the mornings after
are the most terrifying because she has to wake up
into a world where she does exist.

yet, sometimes it happens during class
when she will zone out and all of the sudden everything he has
ever yelled at her, every single time he has thrown her against a wall
and every strong grip or thrown book or bloody nose
starts to repeat in her head.

over and over and over
again.

they are the nightmares that are her life,
nightmares that are her past.

nightmares that don’t ever stop.

stuck on repeat.

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

darling, give me your heart

darling, come here and let me write you into the story
that is my life,
let me write you into the painful bits and the laughter, give me
your love so that i can spill out my heart
and love you back so much that i can’t sleep anymore, give me
all of your dreams so that i can whisper in your ear all of
mine and tell you that yours will all come true, give me
the chances that you missed and the ones you took
so that i can add myself to the list of chances taken
and so i can wake you up, late at night, so we can go
take some chances you thought you missed.

baby, let me give you my heart and let me take yours,
trust me with everything you have ever desired
and let me stay up all night by your side so that we can
wake up in the morning and think about how much
we love each other and how glad we are that we are
so very alive
and so very much in love with
each other.

Sunday, January 6, 2013

and i love you, but you don't know

i wonder if you would be mad if i shot you with
cupid's arrow because i just love you so fucking much and i know that 
you would never ever in a million years love me that much
back and you would never ever hold my hand or kiss my lips, you would
never ever look me in the eyes and bring me close with your arms
wrapped around my waist to show me that you care when i want to cry
because you will never know what i'm like when i'm sad and you will never
be close enough to me to care about me and to pick up on the signs.
 
we spend our time together laughing and making jokes, we talk
about practice and the team and spanish class,
but we never talk about the things i want to talk about, we never
speak about the fact that i fucking love you because you don't know
that i am laying on the floor with my heart cut wide open,
waiting for you to pour your love right back into it and fill in the empty spaces
i have reserved just for you.
 
so i wonder if you can see that i am waiting for you
or, maybe, you can see and you don't want to love me back or don't know how.
baby, if you don't know how then i would be more than happy to teach you
and if you don't love me back that is okay too because i am used to loving
too much and not being loved back, i am used to people not caring about me
in the ways that i wish they would, and so i would not be mad at you for not
loving me back - i would just have to teach myself how to not love you either
and if you just can't see that i love you then tell me how i can tell you without
scaring you away from this girl who is waiting for you to fill her heart and kiss her
scars (and lips and face and neck and everywhere else) and draw her close with
your strong arms to show her that you care.
 
but i'm also afraid that if you find out that i love you that maybe you wil hate me for it
because who can love me?
 
i have yet to meet someone who can.