Prophecy

Little one,
I don't see you as a part of me
Even though I am growing you
Like a spare kidney
Inside of me.
You're already your own person
As you are always meant to be.

Little one,
I don't know what you will look like
I just know that you will be lovely
And loved, more than you can imagine
And for a very long while
Way past the times
that this kind of love
is everything you need.

Little one,
You'll soon be lying in your tiny crib
Looking at us with curious eyes,
As one day too soon you'll be
Lying on the fresh cut grass
Looking at the stars with unseeing eyes
Lost in your own thoughts.
Or, maybe, standing over another tiny crib
Looking at your own little one.

Little one,
For now you're mine and only mine,
But soon I will watch, in wonder,
many others stake their own claims
as you grow slowly away from me.
Always hoping that you keep
a part of me, in your heart
like a good luck charm
not to show you the way back home
but to help you to make one of your own.

going to the dentist

I have long forgotten the face you had
when I thought you were
beautiful beyond measure
and your smile poured like honey
- and maple syrup and molasses -
on everything around me.

Yet the exposed nerve endings

of the cavity you left behind

still make me yelp in pain

every time I accidentally bite on a memory.

please go away

"you will learn to fall in love with shadows 
/

instead of the bodies that cast them."

George Abraham, “How to Disappear,” 

When you're gone
I'm going to tear down this shrine
I made in your name
Inside my ribcage
And maybe I'll breathe easily again.

When you're gone
I will forgive myself
For all the crimes I contemplated committing
Firmly under your influence.

When you're gone
I'm going to forget what it does to me
When a face lights up as I enter the room
So I can get over
The emptiness behind your eyes
Now whenever you look at me.

When you're gone
I'll stop blaming you for my own flaws
And become my own hero again...

Goodbyes

Nobody likes goodbyes. 

so when words inevitably turn to ash in my mouth 

I will breathe them out as inconsequential platitudes. 

After all, mourning is for wimps 

and possibly for people who can't collect friendships like butterflies.

Nobody likes goodbyes.
Yet here I am, saying the same goodbye over and over again.
The cookie cutter shape of the creeping hurt and loneliness
branding my all too fragile psyche once more
making me wonder why do I bother with meeting new people at all.

Nobody likes goodbyes
For once, I would like a proper one though.
For once, I would like to cut a tie so severely
that it would cauterize the wound in the process
and I'd stay committed to never caring for you again.

Nobody likes goodbyes
nice to never see you again, what's-his-name
you never mattered anyway
maybe if I pretend hard enough
I may even fool myself.

The other side

I wish I could ask you
How does it feel like
To have poems written about you...

Do you also look at birch trees,
and think you could grow leaves?
Do you seek shelter from rain,
believing you could make a better storm than this?

When I call you beautiful in so many ways
Which one do you chose to believe, if any at all
and does it ever add some bounce to your step
or do you slouch instead
since attention from someone unwanted
feels the same as
indifference from someone beloved?

I know what being a poet is all about
But for once I wish I'd know
how being a muse feels like...