Ready for Spring

The snow is melting and I'm thanking God because I'm tired of bundling up in all these mismatched layers. I'm ready to trade my thick, striped scarves for paisley ribbons and flip flops. I'm ready to sip on pink lemonade and lather my skin with coconut scented lotion. This is the spring that I am starved for.
Yesterday we played in the snow and you told me I bring out the kid in you. Blonde pigtails peeked out from under my red and black hat but by the time we made it inside my hair was soaked and my hat was lopsided. A 6 foot college boy made snow angels with me and his black dog named Lucy. It was beautiful and while I craved my camera it was so much easier to tackle you without that Sony in my hands. When our fingers were numb and our boots filled with snow we retreated to the warmth of your house and cooked hot chocolate. There were no marshmellows so we picked out hearts and stars and rainbows from your box of Lucky Charms.
Sitting on your plaid couch and watching Quinten Tarantino flicks. You'd never take me for a gory girl but oh how I love all that bloody action. After Death Proof and Planet Terror my eyes were growing heavy and my hot chocolate wasn't so hot. I count the freckles on your arms until I fall asleep and thank God you know just the right way to hug me because your basement is freezing and my socks are still drenched.
When you finally take me home I chew on minty melatonin and look at all the black n white pictures you took of us on my laptop. You trying desperatly to look like a hard ass. Me throwing peace signs and making fish faces. Both of us laughing. and laughing. and laughing.
I slept like a baby but my dreams were filled with nerf gun wars and cotton candy. Bizzare, I know. My dreams aren't better than my reality anymore. <3

Natural Disasters

Yesterday started out with fat free smoothies and pudding cups on the couch. I laid back in the recliner and watched the style network while everyone else went to school. I waited for snow and licked low cal pudding off my fingers and wiggled my toes in my fuzzy No-Slip red socks. When it finally started snowing a beautiful blonde that could be my sister picked me up and took me to get smoothies. Low fat strawberry goodness that wound up to be a mistake because i forgot my gloves and while it tastes like heaven coffee would have been so much warmer on this winter day. We avoided school and talked about love and beaches and high school bullshit until we snapped back to reality and looked at the clock. Second period was over and it was time to apply ourselves, time to admit there would be no snow day for these desperate spring-hungry seniors.
We took our time walking to class, stopping at lockers and shuffling our wet Ugg boots with ease. When we finally said goodbye I was alone and my footsteps echoed on the pastel colored tiles. This hallway will be swimming with teenagers in the middle of an identity crisis in a few minutes. It will smell like body odor and expensive perfume and fund raiser chocolate. It will be loud and hot and chaotic but for now it is mine. and it is quiet. and it is empty. and it smells like the shampoo at my grandmas house. so i will savor each footstep and swing my arms through that empty hall. All this lovely silence is only t.e.m.p.o.r.a.r.y.
Finally in forensics and for once I paid attention instead of doodling poetry on my hand. We talked about natural disasters and liability clauses and preventable deaths. We talked about tragedy like it was this distant faraway thing that could never touch us in our suburban fishbowl of safety. We are comfortable. We are invincible. We are untouchable. And deep down i think we all know,

that we are just fooling ourselves.

Tragedy can seep into the most clean cut universe and implode the most innocent hearts. Natural disasters happen naturally ANYWHERE. And while I will not live in ignorance I will also not live in fear. Because I believe in something bigger. something greater. something divine and nameless because my lips can't form a word for all that beauty. Something some call God, some call Love, all call upon when they are in need and on their knees and tired of desperation. Something not confined to religion, or country, or individual. Something that lives within each and every one of those confused looking sets of eyes i see day after day at my high school. It's that ease that overcomes me when I surrender to the world and know that everything is going to be alright. Everything is going to be as it should. Everything is out of my hands and that lack of control is a GLORIOUS thing. It means that all i have to do is
LIVE IN LOVE.
Nothing more. Nothing less.

After forensics the snow started to pour. Our world was coated in white and oh, it was so beautiful. But that beauty was bitter as we walked to our cars in that arctic parking lot. I couldn't breathe without swallowing snowflakes and your car door was frozen shut. I grabbed out with both hands and yanked on the handle until the ice cracked and snow fell onto my seat. We laughed and wiped it off. We drove and talked more about the scruffy faced loser every girl used to lust after. Now he is just another cocky ass hole heartbreaker and to tell you the truth
I'm not surprised.
It was only a matter of time before he realized you were too good for him. I just wish you could see it too. Stop wasting your brown eyes on someone who is blind.

On the drive home you tried to hit the breaks but the car wouldn't stop. Images flashed through my head, Alicia Keys videos about bloody loves saying goodbye in a hostpital bed and damn all that VH1 i watched this morning. I was texting my boyfriend while you were whispering "stop, stop, STOP" but we didn't stop and you could hear the crunch of metal on metal as we hit that SUV. You looked at me with an expression I've never seen before and I put my cell phone down. My hormonal boyfriend bitching came to a halt and I was suddenly filled with regret for the words i yelled at him while he sat in a college classroom. My screeching voice echoed through his phone and to tell you the truth
now i don't even remember what I was so upset about.
All my period bullshit became inconsequential and I was left with an utter appreciation for life and love and these are the mini natural disasters we avoid every day. The woman we hit was a long haired brunette but she only smiled and asked if we were okay. Thank Buddha for the friendly people still left in the world, I was anticipating furrowed brows and screaming about insurance. I'm glad I was wrong. <3

Skeptical Beauties

The girl sitting next to me wants a tattoo of a cherry blossom on her back and I'm jelous because I wish I'd thought of that. All I can dream of are peace signs and henna.
Long haired girl with high water and grey flannel socks stood in front of the class 40 minutes ago. She is the kind of girl my boyfriend would make fun of but the more I look at her the more beauty I see behind those brass rimmed glasses. She is hiding under layers of Goodwill clothes and selling candy bars to skinny bitches to raise money for anime club. She is brilliant but she stuttered through that 20 minute presentation about Japan. Her cheeks grew redder and redder and I wished she'd look at me so I could smile at her with my eyes. So I could send her golden rays of reassurance from accross this stoney morning classroom.
She is the kind of girl who never hears she's beautiful,
and if you tell her she'll only think you're lying.
God bless the skeptical beauties. They are walking tragedies I pass in the hall e.v.e.r.y.d.a.y.

I swore I would workout yesterday but I didn't. Instead I did someone elses final exam and ate three bowls of white chili. My brown eyed boyfriend rang the doorbell for the first time and I saw how firmly my stepdad shook his hand.
I geuss chilvary's making a comeback
Just in time<3

not writing you off just yet

Yesterday I wrote a novel for this blog.
I sat still and poured my heart out while pounding on my keyboard and sipping on a diet coke. I mindlessly spilled my secrets onto the internet. I did not hit save. I did not copy my words. I just hit enter and then sat in shock when my computer crashed. All those lovely lines lost forever. I could look at it as a tragedy but this is just one more chance to rewrite my history. Take a step back and breathe and look at the situation in a new state of mind. These words will not be the same ones I wrote yesterday. These will be the words of a girl wiser than she was 24 hours ago. Someone refreshed by a weekend of flirting with blue eyed boys working at green tea stands in the mall. Someone who walked on the pavilion in Mount Adams in high heeled cowgirl boots and a golden corset. Someone who had nightmares filled with Cameron Diaz and trips to Paris all last night but who feels stronger than she ever has.
That Friday lunch date did not go as I had planned. My stony silence did nothing to ease this aching heart and even though when you tried to hug me I pulled away in defiance I am talking until my lip gloss has lost its luster and my lips are chapped from too much honesty I swore I would never cover you in. You don’t deserve to know what I spend my days thinking about. You don’t deserve to sit there so beautifully. You don’t deserve one second of this awkward apology and yet somehow the way you’re blinking your eyes and looking at your freckled hands makes me think maybe you really are sorry.
The words your best friend told me during all those 4 hour phone conversations were lies. A well thought, gorgeous stab in the back. I believed him blindly because you hurt me once and I wanted to believe you were the monster all those angry teens write rock songs about. I drank up his elaborate stories about your mind games. I let them sing me to sleep and woke up with a soggy pillow case. I did not think to as you or her or them. I did not need a second opinion or proof.
And even though they were lies, there is one truth. When I was home you were with her and yes, I know you regret it. I know how sorry you are but sometimes
Sorry is not enough.
Sorry can’t make me trust you more. Can’t get you back all those friends you pushed away with your dizzy nights and eagerness to fight. Can’t take back the way you talked to your mom or the doors you slammed in the faces of people who adored you. Sorry is lovely but baby, it will take more than sorry to make me jump. We sat on the curb of my favorite Thai restaurant while you smoked a cigarette and blew angry smoke away from my face. Angry with yourself for you mistake, angry with him for his lies, angry with me because you know I wish I could love you like I did. You flick that death stick into the street and cradle your head in your hands. Your friends are far away and your mom is dying and you have no idea how I am longing to hold you. But those days are over. I can’t make the pain go away, only you can do that darling. But I will put my hand on your back and promise you better days. I will pop my gum and damnit I’m sorry but this is my confession.
He kissed me
And I kissed him back.
And I’m scared the faces of the people that love me enough to want to protect me will stare at me in disappointment. Shameful eyes casting glares at the still girl who lets her heart get the best of her. But please know that I am not blind anymore. I am not caught up in your lies like I once was. And if I kiss you again, you can be sure that if you give me a disaster like this summer again it will be the last time. You can be sure that I will not let you ignore my calls, blow me off, make me feel less that beautiful and loved and adored. Because I know I deserve that now.
I may give you a chance to prove yourself because I truly see something in you.
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice, shame on me.
And maybe ill be shamed but if I am I am walking away without looking back. I am closing the door on you and us and your countless apologies. I will feel for your pain and love you from afar but you can bet your ass I will put up walls to keep your brown eyes far from me.
But I’m not ready to close that door.
Not yet.
Because I have made mistakes too. Let people down. Lied. I am not evil. I am not a monster. I am a teenage girl.
I’m not letting you throw your arm around my shoulders and claim me as yours. But I’m not writing you off just yet.

Too Far Gone

The sad thing is
Yesterday I spent hours convincing myself you deserved a second chance. You were sorry. You meant every word of that e mail you sent me at two in the morning.
I was wrong.
I spent hours lying to myself and the people that love me for the sake of avoiding the pain of losing you. But I don’t feel pain now. I think of all the times you touched me and it burns my skin because I now know where your hands had been before I got dropped off at your house. I know whose pony tail was on your wrist next to mine. Some sixteen year old brunette across the street and if I didn’t love life so much I might just be sick. I was ready to meet you on Friday at our favorite pizza place. I was ready to sit across from you and color you purple with forgiveness. I was ready to let you hold me again like you told me you dreamed about. Your dreams are my nightmares. Swearing you loved me while you snuck around with your junior high sweetheart who lied to you too many times to count. I called and told you pizza was off. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to hear your voice- mumbling apologies and whispering I love you’s and searching for some redemption from a seventeen year old girl you can’t save you. You took advantage of my forgiveness, of my honesty, my easy going love I gave without question. I was there when your college dreams collapsed. I was there when the people you loved left. I stayed behind. I surrendered my summer. But I am not your savior. My forgiveness will not get rid of that guilt. You will have to lie in bed and think about what you lost. I will be sleeping soundly to James Taylor lullabies and Elton John records. I will be spending weekends at festivals. I will be tasting all that freedom again and licking my lips for more because I am rid of your head games. “Dude, I’m just messing with her mind.”
You can’t touch me anymore.
I’m too far gone.

Radiating Love

It’s a new day. My blonde hair is no longer short and choppy and hopeless. Thanks to birthday money and luscious extensions I can flip these long locks over my shoulder and brush them with a passion I forgot I had. Ha. Girls and their hair<3
Yesterday I tried to heal while reading a Buddhist manual for spiritual revolutionaries. I lie on my tummy in a well lit courtyard with an expensive fountain and read about forgiveness, the eightfold path, the four noble truths, cleansing my soul and body and mind and radiating love out into the world. All morning I have been radiating love while I sip this French vanilla coffee that burns my tongue and warms my hands. All morning I have been forgiving you while I close my eyes and breathe deep and count to ten and feel all that suffering fade away. Pain is real,
But I made myself suffer.
I made myself suffer when I put my head on my desk and thought of our first kiss and then our last one. I made myself suffer when I searched the computer frantically with lovesick fingers on the keyboard and forced myself to look at pictures of us before we were broken. I made myself suffer when I refused to see that it is out of my control. Pain may come and go, ease in and out of my universe but I will not avoid it. I will not shut it out or fight it off. I will embrace it, I will love this fucked up human reality of pain because when the pain is gone I am left with confidence and the power of knowing I did not sink to your level. I did not use your secret torments you whispered in my ear late at night when the crickets were outside your window and your friend’s cigarette smoke was filling up your car. I did not lash out at you with blood red words and a mouth full of profanity.
And I forgive you. I forgive you. I forgive you. When you call my best friends and beg for forgiveness they will probably hang up on your monotone mumbling frat boy voice. They will shake their heads and tell me to move on and believe me I will. But I will give you a chance to apologize to my face. To look at me and attempt to shower me in all the sincerity a 19 year old boy is capable of. I will sit across from you and stare you dead in the eye when I tell you that I will not bring you happiness. I will bring you phone calls and butterfly kisses and wrestling in your basement. I will bring you someone to make fun of and tickle and confide in. But until you find out who you are, until you forgive that girl you loved for four years before you even knew my name, until you let go of all that anger that’s flooding your brown eyes and making your fists clench into a tight ball- you will not know happiness. Not with me-
Not with anyone.
And as much as you hurt me darling,
I’m still radiating love.
I want you to be happy.

I fear hitch-hikers, blue eyes, and promises. Deserted movie theaters and bad fathers. Lonely winter nights when the hallways are creaking and you can't see out your window. Pale passionless faces and wedding vows.

Love is my enemy. I hate love and I love love and I have willingly given far too much of my heart to that twofaced emotion that promises eternity and leaves you with NOTHING.

My worst subjects are Handling Hearts and Standing Up for Myself 101. I am failing miserably though i enrolled myself in both of these classes. I enlisted in desperate hopes of becoming strong.

My teachers are middle aged hippies, a homosexual with a crown on her head and art spilling from her fingers, blonde haired heroine who slays vampires on day time TV, round bellied buddha with a childs smile. They educate me through heartache and adventure and meditation. They they hold my hand when the world collapses.

I feed my mind with Kashi bars, green tea, pad thai, chocolate covored raisins, and strawberry smoothies.

My universe is coral colored with flashes of yellow and orange that ignite nights when the stars refuse to shine.

This is a glimpse of my world,

---> these are pieces of my TRUTH.

I have so much more to give

We sat on the computer until midnight making videos in an abandoned kitchen. Singing the wrong words to backstreet boys songs and pretending to know spanish and laughing.

and laughing.

and laughing.

the next morning came far too fast and i can't stop yawning even though it is the hottest day we've had so far. Job interview in a dimly lit resteraunt and I swear if you hire me I'll smile while I open that door and make their Friday nights beautiful. I'll charm them as I hand them their menus and steal their hearts while leading them to their table. I tried to make eye contact and sip my diet coke slow and classy and maybe I wasnt sophisticated but I was real. In the end, I think that's all that counts.

I read my poetry for a quiet classroom yesterday and the love notes they scribbled on ripped note cards take my breath away. They fill me with renewed inspiration and make my pen fly. They forgot their high school bull shit while I read about love and Paris and the non conformists they long to be. They listened to the music I was making even though my throat was sore from a chaotic weekend and nights of insomnia. They clapped when I sat down and now I remember why artists are so happy. Because they give something to the world. Because when they give, they get. I have so much more to give.

The more I read about these Jack Keroucs and Steppenwolves the more I long for escape. I taste freedom and oh I can not stop licking my lips. I have forgotten about promises and love and something I used to pray on. I am living now. This second. This moment. The universe won't wait for me to define my perfect romance so I'll simply take the beating hearts it passes over to me and be as gentle with them as I can. I'll savor the last Friday I will walk into that high school and surrender my restless hunger for adoration to a night of meditation. I'll find my "Om".

It Isn't Funny Anymore

Thunder crashed and he hugged me for the first time in months. The power’s out in a house full of a family that used to mean Chinese takeout and Joss Whedon on Tuesday nights. In the candle light I don’t even recognize them. They are warped by the faint flicker of flame between us and I want so badly to laugh at their jokes but that humor is bittersweet and it isn’t funny anymore.
He held me and cried into my sweat stained gym shirt but my body was limp under his desperate hands. I blinked and read Herman Hesse and promised myself that in an hour I would sit on a rain soaked patio in my pajamas and cry under an oversized umbrella and purple clouds. Smell the sweet storm that just raged over my summer fantasies and wave goodbye to the daughter he used to know. She is a phantom walking barefoot in circles around that mansion she used to call home. Promising love to strangers and swallowing her truth. Conforming to rules that would break her spirit and teach her to hate art. I refuse to be that girl.
Bald headed uncle flew back to Atlanta skies but I wish he was here to criticize mainstream music and smell Skyline with me. I wish he was here to go off on tangents about the details of life unseen by the residents of my world. He rants and raves and makes it beautiful. He sees me the way I wish everyone I ever loved did. As an individual. An artist. A beatnik sixteen year old sucking strength out of poetry. He is far too brilliant for this small town so he returns to his music filled house. To a house filled with cats that know all his secrets. To a manikin dressed in vintage clothes that watches him eat breakfast. But I don’t worry. He’ll be back.
Coffee in the morning with that springtime boy and finally I am a regular. I walk through a mahogany door and they know my face and my smell and my passion for caramel and expresso. It’s nice to be known.

Words of Wisdom

Dearest Mallory,
I am writing to you with hands you would not recognize- callused, wrinkled hands. My fingers are gnarled and twisted but don't worry. On my wrists there are hemp bracelets and Earth-tone beads and silver charms from Barcelona, Paris, and Amsterdam. These hands are eighty years older than the ones you are holding this paper with now but darling they are still yours. They are still draped in memories and thrift store jewelry. Some things never change.
If I am not mistaken you are currently sixteen and utterly lost. You're in love and out of your mind and you cut off all those long blonde waves that cascaded down pale shoulders. You bite your lip when you lie and spend anxious nights anticipating midnight calls- praying for a blonde boy to sing you to sleep while you light lavender incense and scribble peace signs on your ankle. If I am not mistaken, you wish you were a tie-dye-tee-shirt goddess.
Before I go to sleep tonight I wanted to write you a letter to reassure you that yes, you do master calligraphy. You spent weeks in that Sunday morning class downtown but you can finally bring beauty to uppercase S's and lowercase y's. Your signature makes overweight store owners gawk- they have never seen penmanship so closely resemble art. And don't worry, you fall in love. Oh, you fall in love. Over. And over. And over. You surrender yourself to brown eyes and acoustic guitars with engraved initials of reckless lovers. Sometimes you get hurt but you wrap that broken heart in silk scarves and mend it with green tea and Kashi bars. You paint your pain on white linen canvases and hang your masterpieces on a lonely wall. You grow into a Picasso fueled by these next few years of pain so keep all this beauty in mind when you’re drenching your pillow in sweet tasting tears.
Remind yourself daily that there is a rhyme and reason to the seemingly random disaster of our America. Stop eating Weight Watchers fudge bars when you could devour straight up chocolate heaven from your favorite ice cream parlor. I know you think your sides are chubby and your thighs are too wide but trust me on this one, one day you will realize how beautiful you were and long for that summer figure. One day your joints will ache while you do yoga in Central Park. You'll look down at your thirty-something year old cellulite body and remember the days when you could wear low rider jeans and not terrify lollipop licking toddlers. You will regret every time you looked in the mirror and hated what you saw. Please start loving yourself, before you start losing yourself. Please stop writing your poems for everyone else- yours is the heart that needs those lovely words the most. You have always loved to fix what’s broken- always lived to breathe life into the eyes of the hopeless. But as a personal favor to me my dear Mallory, breathe life into your own eyes. Learn to play the guitar. Tell that boy you love him. Forgive your father for not being able to hold you when you needed those arms more than ever. Embrace your best friend. Make the world as beautiful as you want it to be.
Live for today. No regrets. No what-ifs. This is your time to shine darling.
Love,
Mallory

Phsycology Letter Project

Buffy,
Happy birthday darling. You're eighteen but I can still vividly remmember you baking cookies in a princess crown and finger painting to the sounds of Elton John. I have no idea how you have become this beautiful young vegetarianwith a head full of possibilities and a hand full of college applications, but at least it shows I must have done something right.
I know how often you ask me about your dad- that anynonmous man you never knew. I know how you long to know the truth about our lives and your cihldhood and the beautiful disaster created when the two collided. So as part of your present this year my dear, I promise to shower you with honosty no matter how ugly the truth may be. I only hope after reading these words I will still be the heroine to you that I was before.
You were a product of Pina Coladas in Paris. You came from midnight dancing on cobblestone streets beneathe the Eiffel Tower and sheets of Egyptian cotton. Never think you are a mistake Buffy becuase you aren't. You were art. You were a masterpeice in the midst of a European Revolution. Like all beautiful things in life, you were unplanned.
Your father was a musician I met while spending that summer in Paris. Eighteen and he stole my heart with an acoustic guitar and pretty peniless promises. When my stomach began to swell and the morning sickness came, he stopped singing songs for me and fled. He left us for a red lipped senorita that taught him to tango. That was your father honey, a traveling gypsy who gave me the most precious thing in my life. You.
I know I haven't been the best mother. Ramen noodles were a sad excuse for dinner and I should have surrendered thosel ate nights in the studio for Mommy-daughter time with you. But if i could give you any advice about parenting it's that a good parent loves thier child. Unconditionally. They are patient and understanding and they embrace the teenage rebellion that eventually takes hold of all of us. They forgive. And forgive. And forgive. And love you while you stumble through the bitter flavored years of adolescence. If i was strong in anything as a mother, it was in loving you. Perhaps this is the reason for my suprising success- at 18 I was terrified of being a mother. I would look at you and your calleidescope eyes filled me with horror. You were so small, so innocent, so untouched by a material world. You were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen and I was so scared I would shatter you. I would raise you wrong. I wouldnt be there when you needed me. But my unjaded love for you overcame it all. I have always been proud of you Buffy. Always.
My hope for you is that you will always know it's okay to cry on the phone with the blondeb oy next door until three in the morning. It's alright to admit you can't do it all, throw up your hands and scream to the universe for a savior. You work so hard to save the planet darling,
please promise me you won't forget to save yourself.
Be careful with other people's hearts- remmember many have been beaten and bruised and are barely beating but you would never know it because in this world weakness is ugly and being beautiful is all that counts. HA. These are thelies the world feeds us with glossy spoons- please don't believe them. I'm begging you to keep standing out. Blending in is overated and the death of any poet. Don't fade into suburbia- unless that's what you want. I know you dream bigger than two car garades and jean skirts in grocery stores so don't settle for that. Don't settle for liking a man. Don't settle for thinking he's sweet and looks good in a suit. Do me a favor and fall in love. Passionatly. Recklessly. Sloppily. Fall into a love that is epic. Fall into the kind of love that hippies sing about.
Speak your mind. Don't swallow words with a sip of green tea- let them echo on crowded subways, in opinion filled lecture halls, in best selling novels. Don't worry when you get writers block. Anything meant to be written will be written- just open youe mind and close your eyes and be prepared for greatness and callused fingers. Never regret yesterday, it's a waste of time and an insult to the universe. Remember we are all moving in a circle- connected and never ending. Life flowing into death and bringing new life. Hearts beating all around the world and the circle still spins.
If i could dream anything for you it would be that you live the life you've always fantasized about. That you never doubt your intuition and you always know what an imprint you have left on my world. That you make music out of your tragedies and smile while you sleep. You are my inspiration. You are my best friend.
Happy birthday baby
love, Mom.

Life in a Yearbook

One day,
you'll regret all those times you ignored me in the hall.
One day it won't matter how electric it felt when he forgot to kiss you.
One day
No one will remmemeber the beautiful drunk girl in the denim skirt
Whose laugh was stolen from romantic comedies
And skinny legs were spread wide open
No one will remmember the overachiever who sat next to them in English
Her navy turtlenecks covering one sided opinions
And suicidal academic perfection
No one will rmemeber the long haired actress who starred in school plays
Her soft voice and articulate words will be lost to an era of breast implants
And merciless cameras
And the blonde teen dream who made you shake with envy?
In a few years her blue eyes will be forgotten
And she'll gain back all that weight she starved herself to lose
One day my life will become a yearbook
All these faces I wished loved me
All those boys that made me cry
All those girls that made me scream
They will be black and white faces in an amateur layout
They will be four years that I could have been loving myself
STOP WASTING YOUR TIME PERSUADING THEM
Their eyes are open but their minds are closed
and their hearts aren't worth it anyway.

pearly white teethe fantasies

Walking my puppy down windy easter streets lined with victorian houses and I'm beggining to love this new life. Waving goodbye to my charmed days of credit cards and lean cuisine meals was hard but now i have someone to talk to on the phone until three in the morning while candles burn and shadows of skinny deer walk past my bedroom window. Now i have michael buble songs eating me alive and a puppy im falling for with each passing day. I have best friends to drive with and a beautiful faith to mold with glitter covored hands. I have job applications and dreams of pearly white teethe. I have hope to cling to on this cold Sunday afternoon.

I have been snapping pictures like a mad woman these past few days. Trying desperatly to capture all the beauty swirling around me but my finger doesnt work fast enough and the moments are slipping through my new digital camera. Blue eyed best friend dancing in the rain, blonde haired birthday girl wearing a crown with her hands on the wheel and her heart hungry for freedom, track running goddesses banging on a brown haired boys drum set and laughing. Tommorow I go back to school for the first time in a month and I can not wait to smell that dirty beautiful fucked up world called high school again.

censor my heart

Sliding on the kitchen floor in my socks and watching my little Hippie wag her tail and eat pinecones in the front yard. Nuns in navy blue Expedition's driving into the convent accross the street and Hall&Oates on the radio. Yes, I am home again.

I am home and singing in the car while I drive to Krogers to eat icing in the deserted grocery store aisles with my best friend. Home again to read about my tarot cards and waste away in licorice flavored therapist appointments. After sitting in a wheelchair in the Cincinnati airport alone my father looked like an angel in Abercrombie. That hug didn't last nearly long enough.

Back to school this morning and I have never felt as loved as I did in their arms. Beautiful smiles and smells of my high school hallways. Those florescent lights and tile floors are a blessing in disguise, and I wish I could see the green and white of their pep ralley. They don't know how beautiful they are.

Sweating in an overseized gym in purple shorts and old nikes. Running towards nothing and away from everything while Queen drowns me from the overhead speakers. These people smell like tanning oil and protein shakes and when I get home I'm eating a pint of Graeters. On the phone with my dad and I'M SORRY FOR THESE WORDS.

I'm sorry if they hurt you. I'm sorry if they made your face flush with unwanted knowledge. I'm sorry if they stopped you in your tracks. But I'm not sorry I wrote them. These are my truths. These are my soul. I refuse to take back all this brutal honosty with a click of my mouse because this poetry is too precious for that. Maybe someday you'll see, I never meant to hurt you,

but i refuse to censor my heart.

Lying on the back porch, bathing in Ohio spring sunshine and talking to a boy about Austrialia and MTV. Someday we will eat thai food and talk for hours over coffee and small miracles happen when you get to know a stranger in the hallways of your highschool. You can find friends even in the darkest places.

The Greatest Artist of All Time

Sizzling spiced hamburger and melted cheese, today I made my first enchilada. Dominating the kitchen in my best friends sweat pants and sweet smells of mexico fill this house. Sitting alone and smiling because tommorow I will finally get to run into my mothers arms again. Tommorow I will remmember how gently she held me- how breakable I was all this time. Yes I am fragile but oh, I did not break. I did not shatter. I stood tall knowing that I can do this on my own. I can write poetry in the chandelier glow that lights my nights of insomnia and soak up musicals about unrequited love in the sands of ancient Egypt. I can ride a bike down gravel roads in a floppy pink hat and freestyle rap about wasted weekends under my breath as I fly by wrinkled strangers who stare. I can find sanctuary in books with tattered pages and open my eyes to the love that I am being showered with. Because I have stopped worrying,wishing,regretting,aching about tommorow’s lovely trials and yesterdays dirty words. I have stopped wondering what could have been and what might be- its all inconsequential. What matters is the windchimes singing through this open window and the newly born enchiladas sitting on an oak table in the other room. What matters is these words, because they are here. Right now. In a moment they will be nothing but a memory- a pretty inspiration that struck before dinner but right now they are infinite. Right now they are flowing from my fingers with a life and a soul all their own. I can breathe again because I know that all of these dead ends have lead me to a masterpiece. I can stop worrying because every second of my world is a piece of art that can never be duplicated. I can find peace because the greatest artist of all time is painting a masterpiece. And I am living it out.

Today a pretty blonde boy restored my faith in our generation.

Thank you.

It was fading fast.

looking for love in a vintage store

I have fallen for open fields and long bike rides. I have fallen for conservative churches and jean skirts, welcoming families, big sunday dinners, red pickup trucks, country music, tightly pulled sheets, edited movies. I have fallen for a world that once petrified me as I sat alone in the Dayton airport listening to Enya and wondering where this journey would take me.

It took me to questioning my faith but always having it. It took me to long trails of weeping willows in the spring sunshine and 150 crunches on a tan carpet before bed. It took me to a place that showed me I don't have to work to be worthy of love. I don't have to lie or change who I am. I don't have to know the words to all these songs, i just have to start singing, and they will clap. and clap. and clap. until i realize i have always deserved this. This comfort. This peace. I have looked for love in vintage stores in Idaho. Searched frantically through the racks of musty smelling jean jackets and parachute pants, passion hungry fingertips skimming through baby blue lace slips and Led Zeppelin tees. I found treasure in the midst of oudated chaos, in a bin of old price tags and family crests. I held it gently in my hands and savored it because

this love is a novelty.

Beautiful On Our Own

Biking again but this time there's green haired women in leopard print shorts and tatooed men holding brown snakes in wrinkled hands. The sun feels so good and for a single moment in time when I caught my reflection in a cafe window I was overwhelmed with peace. I could breathe. I could listen to the sounds around me and feel like I was part of something bigger than all these e mails from my mother. Usually I find that feeling when the car windows are down and Elton John is singing about some lovely tiny dancer. Or when im rolling around in the snow with an angel who brings me chocolate milkshakes when I cry in mango colored corners. Or when you dedicated Postal Service lyrics to me on crumpled paper and drew hearts by my name. I could have gotten lost in you when you played acoustic guitar on her plaid couch by the fire. That fall I fell for you in golden leaves and vintage trucks and sweaty concerts. Now I avoid your green eyes in the hall because those songs were nothing but pretty lies. You captured me with promises you couldn't keep.

Why oh why do we do this to ourselves? These high school romances that end in petty tears and meaningless pictures that make our knees ache when we look at them. Smiles frozen in time that we will never wear again but we still rememmber in the dark on lonely sunday nights and wonder if they think of us too. We are in love with love itself and most of us don't even know what that is. Movies, poems, articles in seventeen magazine painting a picture of something every girl wants to get lost in. But being lost inside love is not hallmark cards and daiseys on your doorstep. It's paranoia and jelousy and lies and insercurities. It's pretending to understand a feeling that could swallow us whole but oh, how we adore drinking up all that chaos <3 size="5">we are beautiful on our own. without a shaking hand to hold. without the smell of cologne on our vintage tees. It's an endless cycle and there's a whole world of lovely hearts to break.

Monday morning my parents will decide if I get to pack my things and fly away from these Idaho skies. If I get to see my best friends and finish the school year. If I get a second chance to make them proud again. Even if I go home she's scared he will break me down with sarcasm and a new jaguar convertible and his girlfriend who has taken the place of his children. I know I've let you down dad, but I would give anything to be your little girl again. I would give anything for you to hold me like you used to and sing off key Billy Joel lullabies. I would give anything for you to stop looking at me like I let you down.

Useless Worries, Hungry Eyes

Windchimes and revving truck motors floating through my open window. It's a beautiful day and I'm sitting here on the computer struggling to find the right words to bring me home again. I have to write out the mistakes and faults in myself so that they can be read and judged and analyzed and hopefully in the end, if i prove worthy, i can see my best friends husky blue eyes and start looking for prom dresses like the rest of the high school universe. I can stop worrying about plane tickets and custody and start worrying about my roots showing and my pale skin. Put away this game of pretend that I'm sick of playing.

I don't want to grow up.

I shouldn't have to. Not now. Not yesterday. Not when I was seven and you locked those doors for nine hours while my sister screamed and my brother cried and I shoved my face with more chilly dogs than my pudgey body could handle. Not when you were heartbroken again and i held that heaving body with tired arms.

I'm learning that all this worrying is useless. Worrying if they will still love me when I get back, worrying if my laugh will sound the same, worrying if all the pretty eyed boys I put my faith in never really cared. Worrying if I'll be at an airport a week from now or flying high above these corn fields and legislative lunches. Worrying if i miscounted my calories or gave my heart to the wrong person. These things are inconsequential. I live in a world full of worriers who are missing the beautiful simplictity in every single moment. Who forget to meditate because the news is screaming and time is flying through their acyrilic fingertips. I've been burying myself in books and reading about art and Buddah and reincarnation and the soul. About love and illusion and God and sin. These are not the kind of books that end with happily ever afters but they are opening my mind and helping me breathe through the lonliness. Pages of inspiration that I'm drinking with hungry blue eyes.

falling in love with Allen Ginsberg and chicken fajitas

Creaking floorboards in an Idaho gettaway and there's a fly buzzing around that beautiful light in the hall. These floral bed sheets are old and musty and i wonder whose tired body has dreamed in the same spot as mine. I wonder if they believed in God.

I wonder if they were in love.

I wonder if they ever had nightmares as terrible as mine.

Today i fell in love with Allen Ginsberg, chicken fajitas, and a million brown eyed boys.

the world used to watch him kiss his girlfriend in the hall. Corner maybelline lashes against an aluminum locker and promise her it was REAL. Steal her lips before second bell and there they were watching the whole thing.

High school passion is so damn beautiful.

Probably because those kisses are just an illusion and in a month that boy will be learning to love some blonde haired hippie's favorite band while that girl bats her lashes at his stoned best friend in a cold basement.

Some days,

I can't tell the difference between love and a car crash.

It doesn't matter, both are fatal.

Metal hearts manufactured by Victoria Secret adds and happily ever afters.

If it isn't a fairy tale

it's porn and love falls somewhere in between.

For now, I'll smile at boys with pierced ears and empty eyes. I'll eat meatballs at hockey games and wish I could be drunk on you again.

I'll cover my eyes with cheap golden aviators and wear knee high boots with black dresses. I'll discover Buddah and finally forgive myself for not being able to save them.

I'll come across old family photos that make me want to cry and watch a sweat covored preacher scream about Jesus.

"The savior is coming!"

"Where will YOU be when He rises again??"

Drawing peace signs on my wrist and falling in love.

I'm sorry, I want to put faith in your black and white suit because your face is so sweet and your wrinkles show a lovely history. But the pages of your Bible are tattered and torn and written by the hands of men like my father and he boys who have broken my heart.

I believe in first kisses and lullabies. I believe in stained glass windows and lightening bugs and poetry. I believe in record players and falling to your knees when you can't fight anymore and you should'nt have to.

I believe in a soul so divine that it can love a world full of sinners and forgive a universe of lovers.

I believe in the God we find when we admit that sometimes there are things we can. not. change.

Sometimes there are fruits we are not meant to eat.

We do not live in an Eden,

But Oh,

We do live in love.

Accepting these tragedies

I am dissapearing behind Kurt Vonnegut and Indie music.

I am eating in windows of sweet smelling cafes with my mother and drinking Chai tea with a passion.
I am accepting the fact that America is perverted
and roaming the streets are men who pray to a prostitute
I am slowly learning that I have no need to fear the future
whatever pains await in those days ahead will only give me poetry
and there can be nothing more beautiful than realizing you're an artist
The universe is full of people who will only realize they are artists when it's too late and everything beautiful has died.
This is an unspoken tragedy.