Tag: emotional poetry

weeping summer

this summer, the trees buckle 

under the weight of september

an unwelcome guest, she comes too soon

her raindrops drip down my cheeks

and the ice-cold water only ever

gets up to my  toes

so i run as fast as i can for the horizon

in search of better days

but my limbs are not my own

as jagged tree-branches rip at my clothes

and oh god, what am i getting into?

so i try to speak, but i’m all out of air

as the commercials play on loop

and butterflies dance in my hair

and i try to find you

between messages unsent

i sit at my desk, sunday afternoon

spinning out codes on the floor

of my good old living room

i think about gods i don’t believe in

and things i’ve got to do

before i’m gone

isn’t it fun? how the things you hated

soften under a rose-coloured touch

how in the hindsight of the present,

maybe my elders knew a thing or two

i run out on the driveway

a second, maybe two

and feel the water soak through my shirt

let me be the waterfall

of bitterness and hurt

let me be careful what i wish for

let me get my dream come true

let me sit at the end of the tunnel

surrounded by light, and think

oh god, what am i going to do?

vertigo swirls around my stomach

i don’t like wind in my hair

i don’t like happenstance or wilderness

i don’t like breathing in this air

but i do, i do, i do

i feel it all

i light a fire out the backyard

in the freezing cold

i watch the coals sizzle and whisper quiet words of rage

i take an ice cold shower on  a frozen day

and i shiver all morning, coughing and sneezing

and making a mess

bitch and moan about how the world will never be the same again

i scroll through my phone and i feel it all

like an arrow through my chest, i bleed and i cry and i live it again

wake up early, and stay up late

i put my soul into these words and i throw them all away

‘cause i don’t know if i can keep going for one more fucking day

i talk about honesty through my pretty brave face

and i don’t tell you the truth because i’m scared you’ll walk away

i smile and nod, and i sob through all the tissues on the car ride home

i crawl inside my head, and don’t let myself out for weeks on end

i try to help and i fail, again, again, again

i pray to something that i don’t believe in

i call you on the phone

i go to the beach in the pouring rain

i scream until i haven’t got even a whisper left to go

and then i walk down the highway, all the way home

wash my jeans and go to sleep

and try to hold myself gently; hold on and don’t let go

‘cause things are changing and i’m not ready

to stay up crying on my own

the bog

i have sat in the bog

felt the water turn my skin pink and shrivelled, like a raisin

the mud dripping down my throat and into my stomach

god, it weighs me down

i have sat in the bog

until the peat-moss is caked into my hair

until rock-bottom started to droop under my weight

maybe i deserve it

maybe it’s preventative

maybe i should just close my eyes, and stay here

and feel the time pass

i could pick apart my skin

i could pull out my hair, strand by strand

i could get lost in these parts and never come back

yeah, ‘cause maybe

i wouldn’t hate myself so much

with a different face

or a better heart

if i tried my very best to get it right the first try

tried until there’s nothing else to say

i have sat in the bog and seen my fate

in the leech-infested waters

thrown myself a pity party

forgot to mail out invites

and left the candles on the cake unlit;

it didn’t really work out anyway

i don’t even know how to do that bit

so maybe i will cry myself a river

and the current will keep me company

and that’s something that i will never do wrong

it will carve apologies into my aching arms

until they’re really just bone

and all those words i’ve never said

trace a path forward out along the riverbank

the clay beneath my fingertips

draw it out like the branching path of an ancient tree

burnt and flawed and broken

and still reaching for the sun

I tend to really ruminate on things, and wrote this at a time when I was: you guessed it! Ruminating! Um, yeah, I actually really like how this piece turned out, I think it’s really cool.

i found a bird by the window

i. i found a bird by the window the other day

shaking; feathers on the concrete

and i wanted to shatter

for this poor, broken thing

i wanted to love it better

with sheer force of will

i wanted to cradle it with shaking fingertips

and be best friends until the end

of our days

yeah, we’d hold hands in the hallways

and eat lunch by the steps

and he would need me more than anyone else

he would never leave, never run short

of messes to clean up

and problems to be helped

so i could bitch and moan about the mess on the floor

even as i held his hand and spilled the milk

i’d spin around in circles, i’d keep him on a leash

(it was never about the bird, and it was always about me)

ii. i found a bird by the window

and i tried my best to fix him, with clumsy fingers

and messy breaths,

i’m slamming my fists against the washing machine

‘cause who was i

to try to fix things i can’t control

like wheelchairs and blank eyes

i don’t cry when he dies a stranger

skin sagging on frail bones

when there is nothing left to do

i sink to the floor

and plant myself a garden of belladonna and oleander

but my shaking hands

can’t even make nightshade grow

iii. i found a bird by the window the other day

crouched beside him, felt his quivering wings and his racing heart

took a minute for him to recover

but he did; fluttered shaky wings and took off to the sky

with the dreams i’ll never chase

and the dust on my skin

with the ripped-up carpet

and the terror pulsing in my chest

i found a bird by the window the other day

and i cried as i watched it leave

‘cause it’s gonna be happy

it’s gonna be fine

and i’m gonna cry

i’m gonna spend this afternoon standing out in the rain

acoustic version

i think that’s what i saw in you. because they’re autotuned, but we’re the real version. we’re messy hair and yesterday’s outfit, and the most random, hilarious sense of humour.

you were acoustic. you were the most lovely version of a song we’ve all heard over and over again only this time i get it. 

and whatever it means, i think our little group feels like home. and i still don’t really get it. what it means, to love someone for what they are, and how to be a good person, and i know that sometimes i do a pretty shitty job at it. and i know we’re all a mess. i know i’ve written this stupid poem before, and i’ll probably write it again.

but i think we’re gonna be ok. in the end. and i don’t know what’s going to happen, but… we’ll get there eventually.

no matter how hard. and long, and shitty the road is. and i know. i know. i know. i’m not gonna try and romanticize it. 

but in the end, we are going to get there. i promise.

and hey. i’m not gonna leave you alone in this.

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