All these years
All these tears
That I've collected in a jar
When I was lonely, very far
From anyone to see;
Now I take them, old and colder,
Put them in the microwave
And pour them on your shoulder
Where I wanted them to be.

All this time of running round
Of chasing you, but you
Were always nowhere to be found.
I sat inside
I didn't know much pain
Until you died.
I didn't know what comfort was
Until I looked into your eyes
And knew that you
Would always be there.
Least that's what you said.
And I know that you didn't know either
Now you would be dead,
But you lied.

(fictional)

I can't be here alone.
I don't have any presence of my own.
I need someone to tell me
That I'm doing something right.
You can give me the approval
But I can't bring it along.
I'll lose sight
Of it the moment you're not there
No matter where
I am.
I can't be here alone.
I'll lose everything I've known
About myself, and all my confidence.
My own defenses can't stand up
To everything that's telling me
I'm wrong.

There in the mirror
The wall of the world
That I cannot get through
'Cause there's one in the way.
If I could see clearer
I might find a back way
And sneak past the guard.
- But I'll never get out.
It's tricky to be a reflection.
I have no direction
And everything's backwards. I doubt
That I have any freedom at all.
Someday I'll stand up to the wall.
I'll smash it.
I'll crash through
And I'll control you.

I never thought we'd talk about it
But you knew I loved you
And I knew you didn't love me
So I guess it all makes sense.
I know I know you better
Than to think you'd fall for me
And you know me better
Than to think I wouldn't fall for you
And it's no surprise
You understand
'Cause I know you've been here before
And I want nothing more
From you than just to know you know.
And now that we have spoken
I'm not broken,
You're not scared.
So I guess it's not a problem
That I cried about you
When you were there.

*





I don't miss you anymore.
Sometimes I wish that I
Had never talked to you before
And for years I can forget.
But when suddenly you're here again
There's something in your shining eyes
I can't ignore
Like you won't let
Me look away just yet
And in seconds you have captured me.
And there I go, wondering when
And wishing I could see
You more again.

She wishes she could scream out loud
But everyone would hear.
Isabel is tearing out her soul--
If only she could disappear
But the thinning croud
Is keeping her from being
And it's trapping her from inside out
She so afraid of anybody seeing
Who she really is
And that she's there alone.
She hides her insecurity
Pretending that she's on the phone.
She wishes there was no one there
And she could let it go.
She wishes she could sing out loud.
She wishes that her presence wouldn't show.

Yum. Marshmallow-covered cake.
It's gooey and sticky and stringy.
How in the world could anyone make
Such a big marshmallowy thingy?

Oh, no! The knife is stuck!
I can't cut this cake at all.
The knife is getting all covered with muck.
Get another - this one is too small!



This is a poem I wrote a long, long time ago. Back when Melanie was about three feet tall. I asked her for a subject for a poem, and she said, "marshmallow-covered cake." I wasn't picturing a cake like this one, though. I was picturing one that was all iced with melted marshmallow goo. I had once tried to make a marshmallow pie, and it didn't work out very well, so I figured the same thing would happen if you tried to cover a cake with marshmallow goo. It would be like this big sticky monster that you wouldn't be able to cut through with a knife.

If all the strawberries in the world
But one
Could feed me to death
Then I would run
'Till out of breath
In strawberry fields forever.

I see the sun rising--
The color eruption--
The day solar birth;
And all I can think
Is how pretty a scene
But the chemical colors
Of yellow and pink
And the shades in between
Represent the destruction
Of earth.

She's almost out of breath
She said
She's trying to survive
But it's not working.
It's just death
She said --
It's no big deal if I'm alive
Or not.
It doesn't matter.
But she's lying on the ground
And she can hardly make a sound.
And to me it's not that funny
'Cause I'm on the other side
And she tried
To make the best of it.
She tried to not be scared.
But the truth is that I'm scareder.
I don't know how I can live without her.
I don't think she ever cared
As much as I do now
About her.

It all goes into nothing
And it all comes to an end.
Everything that enters here
Will never make it out again.
No one's back to tell the story.
No report of how it is.
A particle of light
Would not reflect back out its clutching grasp
To show us but a twinkle of an insight.
But I'm curious to know
So I go
Into the depths of the abyss
With a secret hope of hidden bliss
On the other side.

What nostalgic mystery
Before the internet.
We played the radio
And songs would be forgotten
Almost,
lightly trapped inside melodic history --
But then somewhere
Behind the mind
I'd find a long lost lyric
And I'd long
To hear the song again
Not knowing, only somewhere on the air,
Where to hear it.
But the mystery diminishes
I'd find it in a instant
Just by googling a phrase,
Title, artist, YouTube, song.

But I was only hanging on
And I was insecure
And you were someone.
In a moment you were gone.
You said you didn't want me here
Anymore
If I couldn't be more cheer-
Ful, I just drag around
An aura of depression.
Well, I'm sorry
But I thought I had a friend.
Now I find I don't desserve one.
Well I guess this is the end
'Cause I don't do this world a bit of good.
I went onto the eighteenth story
High up as I could,
And the turmoil swallowed me into the ground.


I wrote this after watching a movie scene about a girl who had been raped. She was talking to her friend, and her friend said they shouldn't be friends anymore because she was too depressed.

I wrapped your present
All in shiny paper
And I kept it.
And how sweet it was.
I wished that it would last.
So I held it close.
It looked and smelled so pleasant
That I never let you have it
And I'll treasure it
Forever
But forever comes too fast.
I wrapped your present
All in shiny paper
And I kept it
But as time went by
It turned into your past.

I tried to reach you better.
You were suffering and I knew that
But you don't know how much I understand.
I was waiting where I knew you'd be
For you. Did you think I'd ever
Let you slip away from me
Or from the world?
I'm reaching out my hand.

Nice when there's something
That I am addicted to.
Then I can lose everything
In my mind.
Then I can choose
Only one thing forever
--Only one kind
of fulfillment.
And I can lose everything
Else In my life.
Nice when there's something
To live for.

Sometimes it's hard to see
That I am more than my obsession
When I fall and I regress
Into the life of someone else.
Nothing will ever be
Quite as good as what you've done
And I can't see past you.
Your pedistol, it blocks my view
Of everyone.
So stay atop your shelf--
I'll admire you
I'll live through you
And I won't have to look
At myself.


I wrote this when I was obsessed with Lifehouse, but it's a pretty universal concept.

So the world is falling down on top of you.
So you've reached end.
So the stable ground
Is shattering beneath you
And you're lying there
And crying
Doing everything you can
To keep from dying.
Well I know it shouldn't be this way.
Don't let it get you down.
It's just the world
And at least you have a friend.

An unfamilar place
Full of unfamiliar faces
Feeling small
I pretend
That I'm invisible to them.
And they don't need to be friendly
'Cause I'm staring at this magazine intently
In attempt to look absorbed.

And no, I amen't lonely
I am only
Terrified
And if I make it through the day
Then I'll be glad I haven't died
But it wasn't 'till you showed up at the door
Unexpected,
Interfering with the way
I was ignored
(I was protected)
That you shattered all the masks I wore
And held me in your eyes
Until I saw myself all broken on the floor.

Alas, I am becoming like Emily Dickinson -- with the frequency of dashes in my poetry -- but I don't really want to compare the quality of my poetry to hers. I like mine better.

The City

Driving home alone
In the city dark at night --
A city strange and far away
And I don't know where I've gone,
I've lost my way.
I realized then and there
That it would be alright.
I've lost my fear
And now I'm free --
I can go anywhere.


I wrote this after I had driven to a concert in Lancaster, and gotten lost trying to get out of the city afterwords. It occurred to me, as I was relatively calm, that if I were placed into that situation a few months back, it would have had a nervous breakdown or something.

No one can help me now.
I am falling at the bitter end
I know I've said it all before
I've asked, I've begged, I've reached,
I've closed the door
Because I don't know how
To get you to bear with me
And I'm dragging you down with me
So I finally let go
Because I'd rather be alone
Than lose a friend.

Say to me
The bitter truth.
Tell me what I'm worth to you.
An eye for eye
And tooth for tooth,
I would do the same.
But you're invincible
Incredible
And all I ever long to be.
Appreciate your honesty
I would,
So let me know
The bitter truth.
It tastes like lemonade
Without the sweet--
I spit it back at you.
What else SHOULD I do?
You choked me half to death with that.
I sugar-coated mine for you.
You wouldn't do the same,
But you're invincible
And you can take it with a grain of salt.
Well, I'm not strong like you.
I'm shriveling from all the pain
You put me through
And I don't think I'll ever be
The same.

You should've seen
The painful scene.
The scars are in my eyes.
I never knew
What torture was.
I never knew the cries
Could be so peircing.
And the worst of all
The thing that I can't bare;
I was there--
I saw it all
And all I did was nothing.

Where did you go?
The drowning sounds
That no one'll ever hear,
They echo back to you
Beneath the snow
Inside the freezing water now.

Where did you go?
You went to hide
Where no one'll ever know--
Inside Antarctica
You stood somehow
In secret solitude.

But now inside
Your isolation,
Wish you weren't alone.
If I had known
I would have rescued you--
But who would have believed you.

And now inside
Your ice location,
Wish you didn't freeze to death
And thinking every precious breath
How did I ever leave you?

It’s like it’s never been.
I’ve never seen this side of you.
I’ve never seen you cry.
I don’t know what to do.
You’ve always been there for me.
Now I guess I should be there for you.
It’s not that I’m insensitive.
It’s not that I don’t care.
It’s just that I’ve looked up to you
And knew you were the stable one
And I can’t bare
To see my pillar crumble.

Where are you? Are you okay?
What to say--
I guess, I'm only damaged to the core.

Where I am, I couldn't tell,
But I'm sure
I'll make it back alive somehow
Or dead, if fate prefers.

No need to fear.
No need to care
For all I care.
That won't get me anywhere.
I'm here
And I'm alive now
--All you need to know.

Staring off
Into space
I wonder how the world would be
If I could find a place
In it,
If I could find a little bit
Of sturdiness amid the sea
Of hopeless blind uncertainty.
Staring down
With teary face,
My dreams are falling to the ground
And everything I haven't found
I think I never will.
But I'm holding on still
Because you told me to.

I tried to hide my eyes.
I was sobbing but I couldn't show
--Everyone around--
And I couldn't let them know.
A pair of sunglasses
A lump inside my throat
And a staggered smile,
I buttoned up my coat
And I was on my way
Into the lonely world for a while.

I wish you would come to life.
I wish you would make your way
Into my dreams and memories
Into my mind, control me.
Now you seem so far away,
The corners of the earth
Are closer.
Makes me think I'm worth
A lot to you
Just like the rest of them.
Show me all this truth you gave me.
Make it all come true.
Show me all those miracles
You did before, and if you can,
Then why can't you console me
When I'm looking for you everywhere
And crying on the floor?
Well, you can have me.

Send me
Into nothing,
Nowhere to be found.
I can't face myself again.
I can't face the sound
Of disappointment
From the ones I know.
"I expected more from you."
But don't they think it might be true
I hadn't anywhere to go
But down.
Now my time is up.
My luck is running out.
I'm lost. They ask me where I am.
Just hide me 'till I'm found again.
I'll run away from everything.
I want to disappear,
So send me into nothing where there isn't any fear.
Send me somewhere nothing
Is expected from me.
Send me into hell.
They can torture me,
And I'll no longer feel the guilt
Inside.
It doesn't matter where I hide
As long as I can get away
From myself.

This is a poem I wrote about my potential future.


EVICTED

The rainy street
Right beneath my feet;
I’ve touched it many pleasant times before,
But never have I felt the ground so hard.
And the people see
Me standing here. I’d better move along
To the nowhere that I’m looking for,
Since now I don’t belong
Anywhere
Anymore. And I watch them from afar
As they take my things away.
And I watch them as they take my life away
And the scar
Is as painful as a little shard
Of glass inside my foot
I can’t remove because I don’t have any place to put
Myself.
And the rainy street
Right beneath my feet
Is all that’s left for me.
Walking all alone,
I won't get home.

If someone came along
And told you everything you ever longed to hear
Would you be satisfied
Or would you live in fear
That things would change
Or life still would be uncertain
And an hour later
There'd be such dispersion
In your mind
That you'd no longer know
Whether it was said
Or whether it was something from your head
Even though
You remember it so clear?

Good will prevail.
Don’t worry
Though the world is full of darkness now
And no one quite knows how.
What happened to your family?
What happened to your dad?
He said he wanted freedom
And he didn’t like the life he had.
Looking at the TV screen
At things that I want never to have seen
At the celebrities
It makes me think I don’t want to be rich
And I don’t want to be famous
And if I ever got married
I would stay that way for more than half a year.
I wouldn’t be a bitch
And I would tell my children
That they needn’t live in fear.
Though the world is full of darkness now
The powers of the Lord won’t let it fail,
And good will prevail.

We want to go abroad a broad establishment.
We can’t afford a Ford,
And it’s a way away,
So we will go along a long sea route.
We would adore a door
To build a loft aloft our boat.
We couldn’t find a part apart from these few things.
We will set out aboard a board,
And hope the wind assail a sail.
Instead we got a salt assault from raging sea.
It’s better than a tack attack, we said.
But now we will await a wait
As we float on.
We have at least a foot afoot from shore,
And moving slowing forth.
We did ascribe a scribe
To set aside a side of food for us,
But he had left a jar ajar,
And we could not avoid a void therein.
Of rations, we could not allot a lot,
And we got but a piece apiece
Unless a peel appeals to us,
But we have learned our lesson now.
Do not assign a sign-maker to pack the food.
Instead, arrange a range of things.
Assure a sure and blissful journey.
We would not abhor a boar right now,
And we don’t know if we could make
A count account for every one of us,
As someone might have drowned.

Now that I'm 22, I want to display this poem, as for real. I wrote it before, and it's more true now than it was then.

Where did life leave you?
On a step, thinking
I'm thirteen, and suddenly I'm twenty-two.
I don't know how to live.
What do I do?
You're a lonely child,
On the street and desperate in the wild,
Senseless chaos of the world.
It's time to be a grown-
Up. What is that?
Still a helpless little girl
But now you're on your own
Responsible for life.
Leave you here, and you will die.
Everything that you have known
Is not enough,
And you wonder why
They left you there alone.

Don’t smile in vain.
No one here will see
But me.
No one here will know
So go
Out into the pain
Of all the lives you’ve suffered through.
Leave your own,
The one you never knew.
Never be alone.

I tried not to cry
Every night for three nights.
I tried not to walk by
Every single time you were in sight.
I tried to ignore you.
I tried to hide
But somehow I followed you.
I couldn't help it. I tried
To be sane.
I tried to live on my own.
I tried to remain
Together when I was alone.
I tried to think something above you.
I tried not to think.
I tried not to love you.


This is one of my favorite poems of all time.

Your fantasies are sure.
You can trust the ones in them
But if you let go of dreams
You have nothing but the people
Who ignore you
And condemn you
And that's only how it seems
In your crazy, messed up head.
But you want too much
And no one's good enough
To pull you through
Your doubt of all the human race
That the shimmer on their faces
Stays regardless of your sorrow,
And your only consolation
Is you know they'll cry tomorrow
If you're dead.

I walk over the rainy bridge,
And search and search
But no one is around.
I keep hearing sound behind
--The rain
Banging on the ground.
I can't find
The way to something good.
I can't find the church
So I'll just stay behind
Waiting for the voice
Of what I should
And shouldn't do.
And I'll wait to make a single choice
Until I know
That I can hear
You.

There's a baby in the bath
Sitting still and verging tears
Raisin fingers, wrinkly feet
She can't climb out by herself.

Water cooling
Puddles pooling on the floor
No one's with her anymore
And no one hears

Reaching for a higher shelf
Slipping, falling, splashing,
Crying
Drowning, dying


I don't know what made me think of this. I know it's morbid. Sorry.

Water thick
Fills the air
And anywhere I go
Is a solitude sorrounded by a distance
Full of muffling sound
And cooling water,
Distance that's created
In a little bit of air.
The water flow
Softens all the road beneath my feet
And all resistence
That the sky holds to the fall
Of rain diminishes,
Letting wash away the summer heat
In completeness
And the brightness of the day
Dims away.

Guardian angels, come and see
Today I walked along the stream
I thought about the summer
And I wonder
Do you know of me?
Or am I as invisible as you?
You go about your day
Doing good and loving what is true.
But when I seem
To be in pain,
Can you start to love me?
Guardian angels, all the way
Above me,
Tell me how you can protect me
If you don't know who I am.

Blue is a very cool color.
A COOL cool color.
If you were a tree,
What color would you be?
Green anymore or
Blue?
If you were a screw,
Then what color would YOU
Be?
Wouldn't you be blue?
I would be your blue.
We could all be blue
It's true.

(please comment)

Days of yellow
Days of white
Nights of orange stars.
Tonight, the rain will fall
The moon will call
But we won't hear it.
Ours will be the mellow dark,
And every laughing spirit
Takes away a little spark,
And we'll sit here 'till the day
And wipe our tears away.

I came along today to hear your song.
You told me that you’d play another day.
I told you that was why I came along.
You said, okay, just once for me you’d play.
I didn’t hear the notes I wanted to.
The music, it was dissonant and strained.
I didn’t want to tell you it was true,
So I just sat and smiled, my comfort drained.
“There!” you said, and on your face a glare.
“I played for you the song of awful hate!”
I puzzled with an unbelieving stare.
Confused and hurt, I fled from you too late.
But why? I went and thought and then I knew
That nothing’s ever certain. Even you.


Written in Creative Writing class.

Don't stay with me
But don't wander away.
It's you I want to see.

My mind I try to free.
Daydreams come to mind but they
Don't stay with me.

Dreams of thing beyond the sea,
Yet they soak and wash away.
It's you I want to see.

I know you want to flee.
Your thoughts, although you may,
Don't stay with me.

Disregard my soul's loud plea.
Inside, I cannot help but say,
"It's you I want to see."

I took away