Do you know what it feels like when

Do you know what it feels like when I’ve wounded you

When I throw words and leave swords

Do you know what it feels like when I’ve damaged you

Started to break the bridges we built

 

My body goes numb

And everything rushes over me

There aren’t any rivers or tears here

Just rivers of regret

 

I wonder why I was born with such a sharp tongue

Does snake venom run in my veins

Was I born cruel, to be able to hurt the person I think about right as I awake

And the one I pray to dream about in my sleep

 

Then comes the rivers 

That sweep through my body

Like brooms on a spring cleaning day 

I can’t move, and I feel like my heart has been broken

 

Because to hurt you, is to kill me

To hurt you, is to break me

 

And it is the moment after it all, that I am so so so terribly sorry.

Pillow Talk

I like to believe that I’m stronger than most,

But lately, I’m afraid of my own thoughts

And what I can do with them

I’m afraid of your words,

And the opinions that continue to tear apart the words that held us together

I like to believe you care,

But what if we are just users in a game that we both play too well

What if, we were meant to end months ago

But we didn’t. Because I love you.

Does that make it my fault?

 

I’m afraid of waking up one morning with air weighing down the other pillow,

That I knew that is exactly where the wind should blow.

I’m afraid that I’ll walk down the stairs and your face will graze my memories,

I’ll wonder what you’re doing.

I’ll know I no longer have the right to ask.

And it is the little things I’ll miss that scare me:

It is everything I’ll miss that scares me.

It’s interesting isn’t it, how at one time you can be there and the next you are just dust

Dust that collects on 22nd street or the hot tub where we first kissed.

Dust that collects on laughter and memories and the broken strings between your heart.

 

I wish I could see you standing at the top of the stairwell

Knowing we were both meant to end at the top.

I’m afraid that too much of you is now a part of me

That the key has been molded to fit your lock

I wish time would stop.

Just for a moment. Just with you.

Just so I had enough time to cherish it, so I wasn’t always tripping on the the questions I couldn’t answer.

 

I’m afraid I’m never right anymore, which is saying a lot

That the things I thought whole are suddenly broken

I’m scared of caring about you too much

And being forgotten

Most of all, I’m afraid of the pain that will strike after the shock has warn off

 

It’s a dull pain, up until it isn’t

And when it isn’t, it feels like you’re falling apart piece by piece

Like your heart has been replaced with cement and your stomach has been replaced with everything except the feeling of being there

I’m afraid of hurting you, of being a broken puzzle that someone dropped all the pieces to

Left them in spilled cups of coffee or in between the covers

 

We used to love between those covers

We used to be more than just renters between the sheets

We used to be more than depressing poetry or old photographs

We used to be more than wounded

 

I’m afraid one day I’ll be strong enough to know the right decision

Which is the scariest feeling of all

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What I Tell Myself

While growing up,  we are constantly put in front of two paths diverging in a wood.

We must choose which forest we’d rather travel through.

It won’t be easy, I’m warning you.

It’s going to be thorny and dark and you’ll end up alone without a fire some nights.

But paths have a wonderful way of turning into adventures.

Promise me you’ll remember that.

That you’ll remember the storm will only bring a little rain and a lot of beauty.

Life isn’t meant to be easy. If it was, there wouldn’t be a search for more.

There wouldn’t be a want for excitement

There wouldn’t be the opportunity to feel the rush of fulfilling a challenge.

Gravity was meant to keep us down But

Soul was meant to lift us up

The Missing Key

I get this feeling sometimes while I’m walking home and I forget where I live. I find myself walking down your street only to stop myself just feet from realizing home is whenever I’m with you. But I don’t notice, I turn around and walk to my house. Alone, thinking of my grocery list. Chocolate, I think. I’d like some chocolate. I have dreams you know, about losing everything expect one key. The dream leads me to a doll house. I use the key and the house opens to my future. I’m so happy, but you’re not there. I can feel you lost and I wonder if you are walking home like me. I wonder if the only reason you’re not mine is because we never found the right key. Generally after this I wake up and take a bath. It always did remind me of you.

With You

Every morning I want to wake you up with kisses

And watch your eyes flutter back into reality

I want to hear you laugh a thousand times over because every time I can’t help but smile

 

I want to sit here for awhile

And listen to music that reminds me of home and comfort

I want to sing with you

Or to you

I want to be your greatest symphony

Cause babe you’re my orchestra

 

I want to ask “are you sleepy?”

When I know you’re awake

So I can feel the rush of your heartbeat

I want to feel the rhythm of your body pulsing alive

When our hands touch I want to feel fire

 

I want to watch all your favorite movies in one sitting

And be the big spoon with my little body so you know if you fall I’ll catch you

With you, I want to be fun and crazy

And break down the walls we both put up for safety

 

I want to be your antonym and synonym in the way people wish they could be

I want to argue about things that matter

And laugh at things that don’t

I want to know your favorite color

And what you love about people

All the stupid details regular conversations forget to make space for

 

With you, I want to be anything more than normal or plain or boring

I want to drink brewskis until four in the morning

And wonder whether we are drunk off the beer or each other

 

I want you to know I’ll always be there

Because I’m air

I breathe out and you breathe in

And somewhere out there a part of me is always in the wind

 

I want you to know that you scare me

Like skydiving scary

Like I love the rush but fear the fall

After all my heart is just a parachute

And it’s either solid ground or holes in the cloth

 

But with you I want to forget that I’m lost

I want to be flying

I want wings

I want to forget about the scare

And just float there

 

Every night I want to see your face under the moonlight

To remember that  I landed among the stars

I want to turn my face to yours

And whisper, “I’m with you.”

It’s All Coming Back to Me

It is hard not to remember those sunny days in November

When your heart skips a beat on the cement

You’re running through Philly

It is all just too silly as you watch him run past

You think to yourself, “I’m so happy”

And you feel the sidewalk end

You wonder, if hellos hurt as much as goodbyes

Would you ever see him again?

 

That girl over there broke a window

And his lips only taste like beer

You stare at the faces at that party

But he’s the only one you feel here

 

Celine Dion plays over the speakers

And he knows every word

You lay down on his covers

His heart is a hummingbird

 

We danced to the live band

That seemed it was so out of place

And it really feels like you are flying

When the wind hits your face

 

Four days turn into four months

And the sun starts to disappear

Do you know they always say

It is hard not to remember those days in November

When you are thirteen hours away from there

 

 

 

 

 

 

Decisions

I have heard people say that the most important decisions in life will be the easiest ones to make, because you will know. There will be a gut feeling deep down somewhere that is like a sixth sense of survival. Well, someone please tell me how to kick it in to gear because I think I was born without it. See, I’m in the process of a decision, a step in one direction or the other, and I’m lost. I was talking out the pros and cons out with my best friend and she asked me-

“Are you only waiting for someone to tell you that what you choose is going to be okay? Is that what you are waiting for?”

Sometimes there isn’t always going to be a right but is it true that in every decision there is always going to be an aspect of wrong. Everything that we do is a decision. Every moment we are risking some part of ourselves in our choices. When it comes to decisions, I talk them out, I listen to the experiences of others, and it takes the contemplation of every pro and con to decide. I am not an instinctual person, I am a logistic “live as if you have years to decide” type of person. So when talking out decisions most of my friends tell me I will know, I feel hesitant in believing them. I should respect and think my decision through but to know is to have complete confidence in every variable of the decision. Things change, people change, life changes. Decisions effect the changes of life,  and decisions can hurt, and they can love and they in the end may be everything you ever wanted or nothing at all. But for someone to tell me that I will know, that this life changing decision will be easy. Will feel right. Will kick in my sixth sense. Will it? Think of people on their wedding day, everyone has their doubts. Life is not something written out, it is instead something we continue to write.

As I sit here I am thinking through my decisions, and it is my past decisions that scare me of this new one. I am so scared of being hurt and  then I remember: life is a lot more about the pain of learning than the reassurance of knowing. If I knew that half the shit I did would turn out exactly the way I did or did not want them to, my life would be so much different, so much easier. But I don’t. I can’t see the future, I don’t know what tomorrow will bring. I instead lie in bed for hours waiting for myself to choose what is better for myself. When I was little my mom would tell friends and family not to buy me gift-cards for my birthday, because it took me forever to decide. I would go to ToysRUs and stare at all the dolls for hours, looking at which one was prettier or softer or had cuter clothes or…the list goes on. Now that I am older, the way I make decisions has stayed the same. I wish instead that there was someone who would present me with gifts that I was stuck with. Choices I was stuck with, whether I liked them or not. But would I have loved the doll I chose just as much as the doll someone else gave me?

Would I be as happy in my choices if someone was making them for me? If when I asked my best friend what to do, I listened and agreed wholeheartedly, without a doubt if it was wrong. It is the partner that emotionally destroys us that makes us realize what we deserve. It is the cuts and bruises that teach us how to heal. And it is the wrong decisions that lead us to what we feel to be right. Maybe my choices are just reminders of the fact that I’m human. It is one of the many attributes that separate us from animals, our ability to reason. Yes, when I reason with myself I lose sleep and sanity and I run around in circles searching for answers. Yes, I feel stupid and young and naive when I’m scared of the things I have never done and the choices I have yet to make. Yes, my decisions are one of my many obstacles, but Motion City Soundtrack once sang

“What doesn’t kill us makes us who we are.”

     The best risks I can ever take are the ones that put myself at risk. I’m not saying they are always going to make me happy. They’ll probably end up making me feel like I’ve pulled the rug up from under my feet, gasping for air and searching for something steady and familiar to hold on to. But all I can ever hope is that my decisions will just teach me something that can help me later in the end, that further help me understand myself.

Regret is a choice. Acceptance is a choice. Right and wrong is our own perspective.