This isn't how i wanted to feel {poem}

I didn't want to feel like this,

First I didn't want to fall in love.

I didn't want to feel like if you left I would ache--
and then aching, I didn't want to remember loving you.

But I did. So much so.
Memories of loving so intense
they course electrically up my spine,
lingering at the back of my neck
where your fingers used to rest.

Or are they at my hips?
I still feel them there,
can feel my own fingers trace towards your wrist
to catch yours, and together, it seemed,
pull me in.

I hear your words
as if you are next to me still,
whispering truths and wondering at feels.
I do not want to feel--
still exhaustingly vulnerable--
how I do when I realize you are not:
alone, missing.

Shame, fear--
those were not mine to feel.
Torn into
left to wonder at every answer,
every exquisite detail
revealed for love…

I feel everything,
when I want to feel nothing.

Not attached, not wanting.
Not make-believing
that the sweetest of memories
mean anything about the future,
I want only my present

where I feel joy, gratitude.
Where the breath of your memory
dances with my spirit
for how alive I am for having let you love me
and feeling,
with no need for return
(but oh, hope)
that, even now
I still love you.





As published by Elephant Journal: http://www.elephantjournal.com/2016/03/how-i-want-to-feel-poem/

Her; the ocean {poem}

Her skin tasted of salt water,

tears that had fallen of a broken

heart

and the most heart filled laughter--

neither more sad, neither happier,
both pouring of honesty.

In her kiss was the whisper of a Siren.

Her hair tangled like waves

cascading down her back,

pooling at her sides as she slept face down--

the gentle rise of her breath

could be seen in her back

like the curve of a ship's sail,

that same ebb and flow

as pulled gracefully by the moon.

She was a force that couldn't be seen or heard

undeniably powerful

yet illusive.

Magic.

She was a mystery the same
as the depths

of the sea

held dances of lost ships,

tribes of creatures

and tales of drowned loves,

adventures never detailed.

She clung to you like

sand in the crevices of your being,

lasting, but not enough to collect as your own.

She was the dream of escape,

of vastness,

of freedom.

Look into her eyes and you looked to where the sea

disappeared into the sky,

and listen closely enough

and her heart didn't simply beat,

but roared as only water can.

She was the ocean,
immense,
effortless,
a wonder--
and in her mystery
your own desires fell humble,
respectful,
at her shores.




As published by Elephant Journal: http://www.elephantjournal.com/2016/03/she-was-the-ocean-poem/

Writing of our love story {poem}

I mean to write to heal,
letting time pass in the
stringing together of thoughts as words
reasonably emotional,
poignant,
honest--

I mean to write to heal,
but surely I am not mending my heart
but burrowing into the contours
of its wounds.

Each description of each memory
like shards of glass,
fragments of us
that make no more sense on paper
than they do in the vessel
from which I pull them.
Transparent.
Raw.


It's all there for me to feel,
and until I have I cannot heal.

Until I have sat in those depths
and listened to the pulsating
rhythm of my repressed hurt,
angsty,
unfulfilled.

God each word would satisfy so
much more sweetly
if directly to your ears,
if they were to coax out your response--
tangible,
revealing.

I'll call out again that I love you.
I'll write again of tangled bodies,
unsealed lips
and the most gentle fingertips.
Of fears.
Of truths.

I'll detail the wisdom
my heart has acquired in
being willing to lose your love
again and again
and write because I know it is not lost at all.
Too potent.
Impressive.

Your love will linger
beneath the scars,
and pulse with my blood,
a part of my being that
there are no words for,
a story that has written itself and
ends exactly as it is supposed to.
In love.
In gratitude.

The greatest love stories are timeless.




As published by Elephant Journal: http://www.elephantjournal.com/2016/03/our-love-story-poem/

be all you can be {poem}

Live with the potency of your heart.

Hold back nothing

and let nothing be enough.

Your curiosity ought to be

insatiable

and your passion unnerving.

Create without withholding.

Look fiercely at fear.

Cry for every reason and none at all.

Trust. 

Howl.

Make space for sweetness.

Surrender.

You are meant to feel

and your feels meant

to touch

souls.

Make your skin transparent by your words.

See and be seen.

Love and be loved. 

Just Love.

Let no one doubt that you love them

and love yourself

with unabashed abundance.

Unconfine yourself from the need to define yourself,
for you are new in each moment,
with exquisite details revealed,
new and remembered.

Trust your wisdom
and humble your mind.
Be kind.
Revel in the moon, the stars and the sea

Revel in your heart.
Be free.
Come as you are,
combust with possibility.

Be all you can be.





As published on Elephant Journal: http://www.elephantjournal.com/2016/03/you-are-potent-poem/