hundred & eight

It’s hard to walk sober when you’re being led, disillusioned, onto blurry paths. This road feels familiar but your hand in mine feels new. I’m sure I’ve been here before. I’m sure I’ve laughed like that, flirted like that. And I’m sure it didn’t end well. I’m sure I was crushed, spent. But what if this is different? What if this is a new path you’re guiding me along? What if I let my guard down just enough to feel the fairytale, wisp around me? I’ve done it before; what’s the worst that could happen?

hundred & seven

It breaks me to see you broken. I’ve seen you smile a million smiles: sly smiles in class, sarcastic smiles in bookstores, genuine smiles in cars. Whoever is responsible for your smiles no longer reaching your eyes has done us all a disservice. They have robbed the world from true beauty. Distance yourself, pretty girl, from anyone who has you exchanging fake smiles for honest tears. 

hundred & six

There’s this girl I knew, she was tall and blonde with a quick wit and an open heart. She loved until she couldn’t love and then she loved a little more. All she wanted was whatever you wanted and she’d have search the ends of the earth to see a solitary smile.

There was this boy I knew. He was an entirely perfect. But he wasn’t her perfect.

And that’s where nature falls.

No matter how much she’d love, his heart would not be receptive.

That’s what stings. But that’s what’s beautiful.

So I told her, take comfort in rejection. Kiss your wasted time and mark the experience. Everyone has been given a vocation; why would you ever want a cookie-cutter fate when yours has been so uniquely and so intricately designed to bring you your own kind of solace and your own kind of happiness. Chase what you love, and the one who loves you won’t be far behind. And when it catches up you’ll be prepared, for when who loves you catches you at what you love, you’ll spend eternity in serenity and there will be nothing else you desire.

The pieces will fall in perfection, if you give them the time to. 

hundred & five

And it’ll suck until it doesn’t suck, darling. Life is hard and it’s fast and it’s brilliant. Regret nothing. Question everything. People will give you individual definitions of themselves in time, you needn’t try delineate them yourself. Setting expectations is different than setting standards. Standards are for and of yourself, and expectations derive entirely from those around you. Don’t you dare ever put that much trust in another soul. 

hundred & four

It’s consumed me. And I can’t even get words out anymore. It’s hilarious how I could write so much about the hurt I was bound to feel when I genuinely thought I was happy with you. And now that all that pain has surfaced and it’s my new reality I can’t even define it. I can’t even come to terms with the situation I predicted before you even proved to be the person I didn’t want you to be. I’m always ten steps ahead of the moment I’m in until there’s nowhere else to run and all I have is the whisper of yesterday to haunt my tomorrow. 

hundred & three

The three of us laid on the bed. Staring at the fan circulate cold air on our sobering skin. Not too long ago we were awakening from long nights of living vicariously through the story lines we gave our Barbies. We only have our own stories now. How did that one play date end? Why did that one play date end?

hundred & two

Words are coming out me again and I finally feel like I can breathe. It’s like every word typed is a breath and every complete poem is the reason for it. 

hundred & one

Sometimes I wish I’d let things harden me. It seems rather peculiar that I allow myself to be wrapped in the same cloths that smothered me time and time again. It’s a strange thing, being addicted to the addiction.

one-hundred

All in good time, dear girl. One day, you'll awaken to the sweet peace of resilience. You'll look about the world sans the dark skies and sans the harsh rains. You'll make peace with the daylight and as you learn to love the sun, you'll learn to love yourself.

ninety-nine

As your fingers find their way under a different chin and your lips find their way to a different neck, I whisper my goodnight to you from miles away hoping that the ghost of my words find their way into your heart.

ninety-eight

My question to you, then, though it’s been asked before, is how can you miss something that was never yours? How do you define a betrayal of someone who never claimed you? How do you let go of a moment you never had? And how, how in the world, do you learn to build walls when you live in vulnerability? 

ninety-seven

Darling, you were not made to walk among the soft earth to seek comfort. You were created to live and laugh and love. The Lord rejoices when we use our lives boldly and beautifully. It was never intended for you to have it all figured out. How could you possibly, when you don’t even know how long you have? If tomorrow was your last day, tell me, how much have you made God smile? Hell, how much have you smiled yourself? 

ninety-six

I guess at some point you have to be okay with simply being okay. After fighting a battle, either within your own heart or on the field with another’s, I think merely waking up to exist for a while can be an adequate adventure. Never compare your struggle with someone else’s; and likewise, never compare your progress. Everyone’s doing the best they can. 

ninety-five

See, then, I wasn’t shaken by goodbyes, for it only meant a sweeter hello to come. But as the months went on the hellos were more infrequent and the goodbyes were less sweet. The comfort f pattern and the pattern of comfort were stripped until every hello became a timebomb and every goodbye became a grave. 

ninety-four

We caught fire rapidly and we burned everything before us, and when our flame went out, the smoke cleared too fast and all we had to blame was the alcohol that ignited it in the first place.

ninety-three

I’m trying to have words pour out of me like I did before and it seems a kiss is only good for initial excitement and initial heartbreak.  Even my poems are sick of carrying your weight; it really must be time to move on. 

ninety-two

And as much as I don’t want to, I can’t help but think of what is so fundamentally undateable about me that repels guys to believe that I am only good enough for a midnight stroke and a noontime smoke.

ninety-one

My eyes start to sting in reminiscence and my head starts to shake in new found clarity. My head is spinning impossibly fast and my words are coming out impossibly slow. That's how we were, though, weren't we?