My home away from home

This place is everything that French vanilla smells like/ it’s sun streaming through the cranberry glass on the windowsill/ it’s the perfumed soaps I look for every visit/ it’s a place frozen in my memory that I know won’t always be still

The foothills that roll from each city to the one with your home/ I could map out this town without any direction/ I’m afraid for the day that I won’t need to navigate it anymore/ for the day that I no longer turn to you for my easy vacations

Childhood memories float from frames hung in the hall/ the postcard on the fridge I wrote to you from afar/ the stuffed animal we’ve been hiding from you for years/ the pool room we spent the last decade washing the dogs in seems so far

I see this place in every mug and it’s coffee grounds/ each antique store I enter I hear your words of advice/ never start a collection, though your china cabinets are filled/ and I see it especially in each roll of my Yahtzee dice

You warned me not to age though it’s inevitable/ I refuse to believe that this place will never not be yours/ for now it’s where I learned to swim and play cards/ a place where love is free and life is pure

here’s to the new year

i step into the new year wearing the same clothes/ i hold onto the hands of my friends as i go/ i hold onto my love and look back to smile/ and finally i look forward to see how we’ll all grow

i wish you all a year of love and a year of life/ honest friendship and kindness to yourselves/ for me i wish for a seed of faith/ something to root and remain in good health

goodnight and good year to all who browse/ step through to this year with an open soul/ to be better is to change and to find acceptance/ to find a version that is kind and whole

happy birthday to me :)

a summer of friends

a summer of sand clinging to your legs/ a new friendship to keep you company/ experimental recipes and new hobbies to be found/ a summer of long lost and well spent money

when you close your eyes, who do you picture?/ i see people i love, people i don’t know/ a night under a fort of blankets/ a day in the rain with the friends i chose

i send letters in the mail to those I miss/ a collection of scraps and memories from the best of days/ Happiness is not fleeting, but a moment to recall on/ a series of long car rides and sitting among waves

a summer i will miss and long for when it passes/ friendships that will stay even when the weather turns/ trading a day of sunshine for a night by the fire/ i wonder how i’ve deserved such a world

lonely friendships

what are friendships if not uneven?/ why are the closest always the furthest away?/ the simplicity of connection is overruled for greed/ you want to leave, so i beg you to stay

loneliness is being the third person there/ it’s sitting alone, surrounded by people/ second-guessing your role in the conversation/ telling yourself the quiet is more peaceful

i offer too much that i don’t want to give away/ i extend my hand for the sake of niceties/ you take it too far and won’t let me go/ i make myself bitter in an attempt to please

i have no tangible evidence for any of this/ i’m perfect on paper, i’m well aware/ i have it all, what else could i need?/ but when i look around, there’s no one else there

flying with you, faith in the sun

blankets on the beach

the same blood that keeps me warm rushes to my face/ yet i’m cold while flushed and my balance is off/ i tip and i turn and i tumble to the floor/ the blood in my veins cuts me off to a cough

here you are and there she is/ your jacket, my arm, a blanket on the beach/ we’re so intertwined and i’m knotted all over/ a silent moment where i’m forced to speak

no rush of anger, yet swift and steady upset arises/ i trip over the imaginary lines we all drew/ the nerves in my body stand on end/ axed to stubs, were my words misconstrued?

night terrors

i come in a plastic box

am i a woman or am i a doll/ this porcelain is bumped and cracked/ reddened and roughly hewn/ the architect seems to have hammered and have hacked

shatter me to pieces and sew me back up/ implant a seed the color of grass/ pop in a button that will shine in the dark/ all the worn edges will chatter and clash

weather me down, leave me in the rain/ warm me back up all toasted and tame/ i break and i shatter, the outside seeps in/ i’m just a doll, but you’re just the same

rain in the air