What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

What would happen if you woke up tomorrow feeling differently,

feeling as if it's not worth the wait,

wasted time spent wishing you were somewhere else

with someone else, your soul mate?

What if you spent all this time thinking and seeing

wrong?

Will you wake up?

You might just start self defending your

heart from aching and

convince your mind to start braking.

You know you're hanging in there,

but for how long?

Eventually it will catch up to you, yet again.

The doubt.

You know exactly what I'm talking about.

That nagging twitch in your head,

filling you will an endless dread.

You'll see her in the right way,

the way that will lead you away.

And she'll be left in the wrong place

looking in the mirror

and questioning her face.

But, then again -

you could always talk to her

and realize your feelings never

changed.

And that she is who she is.

So stop making worries over it all and

start living in the free fall.

The ground is hard,

but you've hit it before, so you know what's in store.

The Past

Staring at yet another picture, she begins to form a distorted vision

of the stories she was told and memories she should have never forgotten.

What she sees is happiness but it makes her pathetically sad.

The discarded pile only manages to remind her of death, guilt and decay;

of past emotions captured and forgotten with time.

Birthdays and vacations, full of love and togetherness

conflict with recent pains of growth and separation.

The pictures of a relationship tell the story of a bold, young and careless love

coming to a complicated climax.

Her vision blurs, but she makes out each

awkward smile or toddler's eager grin;

imprinted and stowed away in an attempt to grasp

the fleeting moment undamaged by age.

The discarded pile of the past sifted through, one by one.

Each, a false fountain of youth combatting

the impatience of time.

But the past is just the past.

An overwhelming urge to give in to her emotions overpowers her

and she has to look away from these precious moments

caught and kept safely away,

in a rotting box.

Only love.

the dreams will continue to haunt my mind,
the mind of a girl, no longer mine,
only your's.

i've learned we're fragile bubbles
and kids are careless.

you see me now
clearer than ever before.
i have no control,
i have no limit,
i have no love.

when will my free spirit die
so i can be free to be happy?

Musée des Beaux Arts

(Breughel's Fall of Icarus)

About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters; how well, they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

by W.H. Auden

Lovely love.

I will always picture you in my mind as a happy boy in love, who is now loving despite having loved and lost.

Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem In Memoriam:27, 1850:

I hold it true, whate'er befall;
I feel it, when I sorrow most;
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.

I'm scared to reach out (bringing back insanity)

for the fear of pulling something unwanted back is too strong.

I have my eyes held tightly shut.

I can't tell where I am,
and I can only guess as to where you are.
It's the guessing that getting to me.

I'd like to know where my other half is and if he's alright.
But I know that I indefinitely gave up
all privileges to that knowledge.

I hold my eye so tight because the rest of me is unraveling.

---- Ah, Fuck it. ----

I should just embrace it.
Grasp all the swirling pieces of myself, all this shit:
then
Jump off a cliff and hope to God I fly.

And I'll say farewell to the love drug
my pants are staying on honey bunch
- so go back to fucking your friends
and go to bed alone
and while you're at it
- go smack your head full of reality.
(This can be obtained through excessive contact with a brick wall)

You're living in your dreams babe.
Time to wake up,
your sweet mommy's not holding your hand anymore.

The moral of this story is:

I'm above giving into my bodily urges

After all, "I'm a fucking bird" I tell you.
So: goodbye, farewell, I bid you adeu!
And I'll float off like Jeffrey in his hot air balloon.

One Art by Elizabeth Bishop (1911 - 1979)

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three beloved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

-- Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) a disaster.

The good morrow.

THE GOOD-MORROW.
by John Donne

I WONDER by my troth, what thou and I
Did, till we loved ? were we not wean'd till then ?
But suck'd on country pleasures, childishly ?
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers' den ?
'Twas so ; but this, all pleasures fancies be ;
If ever any beauty I did see,
Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream of thee.

And now good-morrow to our waking souls,
Which watch not one another out of fear ;
For love all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone ;
Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown ;
Let us possess one world ; each hath one, and is one.

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest ;
Where can we find two better hemispheres
Without sharp north, without declining west ?
Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally ;
If our two loves be one, or thou and I
Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die.

I love you less, now that I know you.

On Wednesday I had to make the 20 min walk to West Campus for my 3 hour psychology class. I was alone, but I had my music. I was listening to "Walking on a Dream" by Empire of the Sun.
So, I was making the snowy trek to my class. It was so cold outside, but I didn't feel it. It was one of those rare moments when you just realize that all worries about yourself, your head, your heart: are not important. I just watched the snow fall, smiled at people passing by and enjoyed the peace of a peaceful mind. It wasn't that I forgot about all my troubles, my regrets, my sadness caused by all the things I've done to other people, worrying what they think of me - hating me; it was that I was somehow elevated above, looking down on problems and saying: All I need is me. Because in all of this giant universe of ours, no one will really understand us and get us as well as we, ourselves, do. Of course there will be that person who you talk to constantly, perhaps the person will love you forever and die holding your hand, but they can never get inside your head - you will always think first and tell them later. You are the primary objective. Selfishness is key to self love.
And ya, breaking up is hard, because you lose the person so close to fully understanding you. But they're never really there if you fight over the same things and they don't support your dreams. After all, what's worse than loving someone - someone so close to you, that sees you as plainly as you see yourself - who doesn't accept you and holds you back. To allow someone to hold you down, you're showing how much you hate yourself.My goal is to meet a person who ignores little common annoyances. What I mean by this is that they will see me as a separate person. Way too often people try to latch on to another and control the outcome of their lives. I'm all for loving someone so completely that your heart jumps at the sight of them and you are an emotional mess, but people need their own lives too.

This is all I ask:

Let me be proud of who I am,
let me change myself (I will still love you all the same),
then let me grow up in this crazy world (I'll hold your hand if I need to),

let me learn new things everyday,
let me stress out and worry about my future,
then let me have space to get better,

let me wear the clothes I like,
let me tattoo my body if I want to (I'm only hurting myself),
then let me confess my mistakes (I have many),

let me be free,
let me go and
then (please) let me come back when I'm really.

I'd do the same for you.

Liar

I am forever behind my invincible shield
-behind hardened steel and twisted metal-
fabricated to hide the portrait of a little girl.
Medal designed to protect the child from the harmful
effects of the great ball of fire we all call the sun.
The once tender expression on the child’s face
crafted into a horrifying battle mask of cooled fire.

Under this mask, I found refuge before,
now I’m trapped in a room without a door –
a cave without a light –
a forest without a fire.
A prisoner of my future self.

I have abandoned who I was before,
when I promised that I would not hide any more
but days passed, the sun rose and fell
and the steel began to enclose my soft inner shell.

One day I will break free from this metal tree,
I will tear through the bark of razors,
I will rip the branches of knives,
and I will pull the mask from my skin.
I am free, I will shout.
I will throw this ugly mask out.
The warmth of the air will shock me and I will yearn to replace
the cool comfort of the steel back to my face.
But before I do,
as I raise the mask, I will not prevent myself from seeing
the reflection of the immobile little girl in the battle mask of cooled fire
as she mocks me softly, whispering to my painted lips: liar, liar, liar.

How To Be Alone

HOW TO BE ALONE by Tanya Davis

If you are at first lonely, be patient. If you've not been alone much, or if when you were, you weren't okay with it, then just wait. You'll find it's fine to be alone once you're embracing it.

We could start with the acceptable places, the bathroom, the coffee shop, the library. Where you can stall and read the paper, where you can get your caffeine fix and sit and stay there. Where you can browse the stacks and smell the books. You're not supposed to talk much anyway so it's safe there.

There's also the gym. If you're shy you could hang out with yourself in mirrors, you could put headphones in (guitar stroke).

And there's public transportation, because we all gotta go places.

And there's prayer and meditation. No one will think less if you're hanging with your breath seeking peace and salvation.

Start simple. Things you may have previously (electric guitar plucking) based on your avoid being alone principals.

The lunch counter. Where you will be surrounded by chow-downers. Employees who only have an hour and their spouses work across town and so they -- like you -- will be alone.

Resist the urge to hang out with your cell phone.

When you are comfortable with eat lunch and run, take yourself out for dinner. A restaurant with linen and silverware. You're no less intriguing a person when you're eating solo dessert to cleaning the whipped cream from the dish with your finger. In fact some people at full tables will wish they were where you were.

Go to the movies. Where it is dark and soothing. Alone in your seat amidst a fleeting community.
And then, take yourself out dancing to a club where no one knows you. Stand on the outside of the floor till the lights convince you more and more and the music shows you. Dance like no one's watching...because, they're probably not. And, if they are, assume it is with best of human intentions. The way bodies move genuinely to beats is, after all, gorgeous and affecting. Dance until you're sweating, and beads of perspiration remind you of life's best things, down your back like a brook of blessings.

Go to the woods alone, and the trees and squirrels will watch for you.
Go to an unfamiliar city, roam the streets, there're always statues to talk to and benches made for sitting give strangers a shared existence if only for a minute and these moments can be so uplifting and the conversations you get in by sitting alone on benches might've never happened had you not been there by yourself

Society is afraid of alonedom, like lonely hearts are wasting away in basements, like people must have problems if, after a while, nobody is dating them. but lonely is a freedom that breaths easy and weightless and lonely is healing if you make it.

You could stand, swathed by groups and mobs or hold hands with your partner, look both further and farther for the endless quest for company. But no one's in your head and by the time you translate your thoughts, some essence of them may be lost or perhaps it is just kept.

Perhaps in the interest of loving oneself, perhaps all those sappy slogans from preschool over to high school's groaning were tokens for holding the lonely at bay. Cuz if you're happy in your head than solitude is blessed and alone is okay.

It's okay if no one believes like you. All experience is unique, no one has the same synapses, can't think like you, for this be releived, keeps things interesting lifes magic things in reach.

And it doesn't mean you're not connected, that communitie's not present, just take the perspective you get from being one person in one head and feel the effects of it. take silence and respect it. if you have an art that needs a practice, stop neglecting it. if your family doesn't get you, or religious sect is not meant for you, don't obsess about it.

you could be in an instant surrounded if you needed it
If your heart is bleeding make the best of it
There is heat in freezing, be a testament.

Frustration

There is a woman in the mirror
she smiles and laughs with ease.
The image is me?

Will she ever find love again?
Does she even want to?
I find little comfort in these questions.

I want to make the woman frown,
become aware of her prison
SCREAM and break the mirror.

We no longer have love to keep us warm.

But she just keeps smiling.
And I'm left to deal with the emptiness
and the constant questions.

When will someone see
the cruelty winding inside
of this shell
of this smiling woman
of this facade
of me?

I Really Like Him

I really do.
But I don't want to be a girlfriend. At least I don't think it would be right. Not right now. But I think about him all the time. Does he think about me? I text him and hope he'll reply. I wait and stress about school and cry and breakdown and even hallucinate at little.

I'm glad you replied - my heart was about to beat too fast and die.

... was I that close to death last night? If so, all I could think about was you
and who would be there to talk to
while I cried, with fear
suffocating me as I died.

How poetic and romantic would be death by a pounding heart?

I have already received more than I could ever deserve
from this world - a new start.

House of Leaves

Little solace comes
to those who grieve
when thoughts keep drifting
as walls keep shifting
and this great blue world of ours
seems a house of leaves

moments before the wind

- Mark Z. Danielewski

A Damaged Boy and the Harlot

The walls around you contain
all your bad boy pain
stolen by a kiss
she wont complain.

Her hands hold
the world
of desire;
yours
love.

The harlot is cold
to your touch
dead
to your heart.

She made sure to warn you
before you felt it.

She wont be around to catch you
or wipe your tears.

All your bad boy pain is your own
let her go before she gives you more than you can handle
or she'll have to break another heart with a desirous moan.

Me and You

It truly is a shame.
Here I am perfect and happy,
and there you are so angry and alone.

I've made so many good friends, so much better than the ones I had.
I'm never alone with my thoughts or tears.
I am simply wonderful and everything I do is the right decision.
I never regret anything because everything I do is right,
and when I cry snot doesn't drip down my beautiful face.

I shit rainbows.

I smile and happiness spreads.
I drink to forget all the amazing things I've done and said.
I never wish I was dead.

And then there's you.
Sitting in your room alone
hating yourself for all you've done.
Wishing you had your good friends around you;
the ones back at home.

You have so many regrets about decisions
you thought you had to make.
And when you cry, you are not a pretty picture.

So, you're crying tears that no one sees and loving
someone who has every right to hate.

You pass the time with shows
and music, but everything in the world
reminds you of the good times.
Your closet is full of him and his smell.
There's no doubt you deserve this hell.

After awhile, me and you becomes I.
And the person in the mirror isn't the person I wish to be,
but the person I wish the one I love would see.

A Woman's Last Words by Robert Browning

I.

Let's contend no more, Love,
Strive nor weep:
All be as before, Love,
—Only sleep!

II.

What so wild as words are?
I and thou
In debate, as birds are,
Hawk on bough!





III.

See the creature stalking
While we speak!
Hush and hide the talking,
Cheek on cheek!

IV.

What so false as truth is,
False to thee?
Where the serpent's tooth is
Shun the tree—

V.

Where the apple reddens
Never pry—
Lest we lose our Edens,
Eve and I.

VI.

Be a god and hold me
With a charm!
Be a man and fold me
With thine arm!

VII.

Teach me, only teach, Love
As I ought
I will speak thy speech, Love,
Think thy thought—

VIII.

Meet, if thou require it,
Both demands,
Laying flesh and spirit
In thy hands.

IX.

That shall be to-morrow
Not to-night:
I must bury sorrow
Out of sight:

X.

—Must a little weep, Love,
(Foolish me!)
And so fall asleep, Love,
Loved by thee.

Robert Browning and the Jealousy

For the first time on my blog, I have to recommend an amazing poem to the masses. We read it today in English class and like most things taught in English, one may assume that it is some Shakespearean bull. But, don't judge too soon, for the haunting after effects the poem leaves, can easily make it hard for you to sleep tonight or to look your loved one in the eyes. So, without much further ado, I give you my new favourite poem from the great lyrical poet, Robert Browning.

Porphyria's Lover














The rain set early in to-night,
The sullen wind was soon awake,
It tore the elm-tops down for spite,
And did its worst to vex the lake:
I listened with heart fit to break.
When glided in Porphyria; straight
She shut the cold out and the storm,
And kneeled and made the cheerless grate
Blaze up, and all the cottage warm;
Which done, she rose, and from her form
Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl,
And laid her soiled gloves by, untied
Her hat and let the damp hair fall,
And, last, she sat down by my side
And called me. When no voice replied,
She put my arm about her waist,
And made her smooth white shoulder bare,
And all her yellow hair displaced,
And, stooping, made my cheek lie there,
And spread, o'er all, her yellow hair,
Murmuring how she loved me--she
Too weak, for all her heart's endeavour,
To set its struggling passion free
From pride, and vainer ties dissever,
And give herself to me for ever.
But passion sometimes would prevail,
Nor could to-night's gay feast restrain
A sudden thought of one so pale
For love of her, and all in vain:
So, she was come through wind and rain.
Be sure I looked up at her eyes
Happy and proud; at last I knew
Porphyria worshipped me; surprise
Made my heart swell, and still it grew
While I debated what to do.
That moment she was mine, mine, fair,
Perfectly pure and good: I found
A thing to do, and all her hair
In one long yellow string I wound
Three times her little throat around,
And strangled her. No pain felt she;
I am quite sure she felt no pain.
As a shut bud that holds a bee,
I warily oped her lids: again
Laughed the blue eyes without a stain.
And I untightened next the tress
About her neck; her cheek once more
Blushed bright beneath my burning kiss:
I propped her head up as before,
Only, this time my shoulder bore
Her head, which droops upon it still:
The smiling rosy little head,
So glad it has its utmost will,
That all it scorned at once is fled,
And I, its love, am gained instead!
Porphyria's love: she guessed not how
Her darling one wish would be heard.
And thus we sit together now,
And all night long we have not stirred,
And yet God has not said a word!

Wishing Well

In your innocence,

you wish with good intentions.

When will this minute pass?

When will this hour end?

When will this week be over?

When will this month go by?

But, when will it be time to live at last?

Sometime soon, our time will end.

And we’ll have nothing to remember as we fade.

Our hands will strain for another minute.

Our limbs will reach for just one more day.

And our molten hearts will leak hot from our mouths as we pretend,

that everything’s ok.

We never let ourselves be beautiful in our own eyes.

Our baby skin and our baby hearts have long gone.

Why did we spend a lifetime wishing for more, wishing well, and hating what was drawn?

And we’re scared of never being able to love ourselves.

Now it’s too late and our skin is dead, our hands are limp and our eyes are rust.

And our leathery old skin will turn to dust.

It will be too late by the time you know,

we were wishing our time away and we forgot to let our baby skin glow.

We will regret never feeling the heart beat of a lover

or taking just one moment in a lifetime to discover

the comfort of crying on a shoulder and being protected,

while telling a secret to a stranger, soon connected.

You wished your time away

and now you're stuck hoping for just one more day.

"Distance means absolutely nothing, when someone means so much."

I stand outside in the middle of the night,

and with my unblinking eyes, I attempt to count the stars.

I want to capture every beautiful thing in this world before it’s too late.

A cool breeze passes over my body, sending shivers over my skin while

frosty fingers graze my face and caress my wild hair,

but I don’t mind.

I’m not cold.

My heart is on fire, the flames licking my skin and I just smile at the sheer simplicity

and beauty of it all.

I’m frozen in place with my eyes charmed by the stars.

So, this is what love feels like.

Today you gathered me in your arms and asked me how I felt at that exact moment.

I could not find the poetic words you deserved to hear.

But, the feeling, pulsing inside of me, making my heart beat loudly in my chest,

gave me little doubt as to my answer.

I stared into your waiting eyes, and with a quiet smile I told you,

“I’m happy."

Now, I look around at the place where I grew up,

at the world that I ignored with my deformed vision.

And unlike time and time before,

where I hung my head down

and watched my feet move rapidly over jagged stones,

which pierced through the soles of my shoes,

my sore feet just don’t feel like moving anymore.

I lift my head up high in order to capture every beautiful thing in this world

as I wait for you to come stand beside me.

And while you attempt to count the stars,

I smile quietly and feel the energy of my boldly beating heart.