Nevermind You see You were never mine Not the way I needed you to be You were an illusion A twenty-four and seven hologram Insubstantial and incapable Pinocchio with a nose job A foundation full of rot On which we placed our house And when the floor fell out You did not reach for me Did not treat my scrapes Nor bandage my wounds You told me to walk it off Toughen up It wasn't that big a deal Not everything was about me YOU were the one who was injured here Look at what I did to YOUR floor Look at what I did to YOUR life And I believed I was the weak spot The salt in the wound of us
Nevermind You see You were never mine You simply made me believe In an us without a we Told me that was how it was supposed to be My every need an inconvenience My efforts doomed to fall short A fat lazy black bitch Who just wouldn't listen Who just wouldn't drown my sense of self in your ego And join you in your fortress of delusions
Nevermind You see You were never mine And now I belong to me After taking too long to see I needed to be worth more to me Than I was ever worth to you
And so the sun begins its final setting In that final twilight a transformation US becomes YOU and ME Without pomp or party The bittersweet return to ourselves Unwoven and remade Hopes already decaying underground Receive no grave marker Hard won freedom and quietly resonating loss We are becoming reluctant singularities This fading light falls upon the final paragraph in the book of us Two new books await Unmarred by pain and tears I wish I could say there will be no mourning There is a hole where the unwritten life was excised A wound where the light just doesn't reach and never will I am told this is not unreasonable Deeply feeling people cannot stop feeling Life is nowhere near so black and white to allow for such I send with you the last of my hope Hope you will find your way Hope you will learn to heal your fractures Hope you can become the father you wanted to be As the calendar counts down The minutes marching relentlessly by I reflect on my love for you that never died It just couldn't thrive or survive the wreckage we became We have forever marked each other with kisses and scars As stamp and ink erases us I gratefully return you to your own keeping And truly wish you well
You finally let your mask slip And with it crumbled the dam I built for you Made of guilt and grief and pity You tore it all down with four texts Relieved me of the strain of false responsibility By revealing your true and malignant self Through the dust and dirt I finally knew what freedom felt like As the stones tumbled away and the air cleared I could finally see you sharply I knew in that moment I had done the right things A rumble began to rise As the rage began to ascend Suppressed beneath my compassion for you Barricaded by empathy your didn't deserve
Now the pain and hurt and grief and rage I held back for this last year Ices my skin Darkens my eyes Eliminates my capacity for compassion And awakens the tactician's skills The quiet, calculated, dark, divine feminine Is finally assuming her throne within me
Welcome to my healing era No fucks are given here anymore
These poems are a journey That began in the light of hope and love Then slowly meandered through increasing darkness They dare to expose the skeletons and demons Barely hidden behind my front door for too long The narration begins in the middle After darkness had well fallen And documents my struggle to breathe My desperate journey to find myself again
And for those who live with horrors who wear human faces If I found my way free I know you can too Let these poems serve as proof That though it is not easy Freedom can be won You can take your life back Write the story exactly as YOU wish it to be
Sometimes the dragon burns down the world As long as you’re standing No matter how wounded You can slay that dragon You ARE the hero of your story YOU get to say when the story is over YOU get to decide how the new book starts YOU get to do whatever the hell YOU want Take my story and forge it into your sword of courage SLAY
I am the fourth daughter to do it alone Independence and survival are in my DNA Only child to a single mother Only granddaughter amongst the cousins Only kid on my block I have lived in comfortable aloneness most of my life Do not believe I do not get lonely I know how to remedy loneliness Trusted family Tribe Are always a keystroke or "hello" away
I'd prefer to have a partner To help me raise and support my children But not at the cost of my independence My independence is foundational in my peace If I cannot retain my independent spirit I cannot sustain my sense of self I need a partner who walks alongside me Who understands that I need to run in my wildness Who does not try to domesticate me Into something less than myself
Aloneness is not absence or lack It is the space where I meet myself It is the door to my Narnia The place where unfettered dreams thrive Where words waltz in ballgowns and tails Where stories bloom from rich soil Where I sit in conversation with discomfort Where I sit in conversation with my gods It is the garden of my delights And it is as precious to me as air
How do I manage alone you ask I understand that I'm never really alone I'm as alone as I choose to be I'm helped as much as I choose to ask for it It is not as perfect or simple as these stanzas may imply But the essence of my truth is here Simplified Distilled into a comprehensible version Of my vast and complex reality A demonstration of shifting perspective Being alone carries so much oppressive connotation I choose to experience it as a necessary liberation Allowing me to navigate life by my own north star Inspiring me to never lose sight of myself again
My significant other Is more other than significant now I wish I felt better about this fact I do not miss the now of him I’m still in love with the then of him When love knocks you can never know The beauty or horror in its entourage You believe love can conquer all And learn that love is often not enough My significant other left A significant mark on me That is hardly insignificant
The enduring redwood is dead Meant to withstand Storm and fire and drought Heartwood rotted from within Disease and neglect Claimed their prize A reminder that Sometimes good things die
And so comes the end of the heaviest chapter The plot twisted dramatically In the hands of an unreliable narrator Linear time fractured Slowed Ran backward Perspectives shifted Creating more confusion than clarity
Muted colors of nostalgia dull recollections Emotional sharpness blunted The hollow ache of a long goodbye Completed with the deliberate placement Of an arch-ending period.
The next act begins with a page turn “THE NEXT CHAPTER” written atop it
Words Wishes and Wisdom 