MW
I’ll Breathe In Your CO₂
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Reality lingers in the folds of stolen moments—when it’s just you and me
So close our eyelashes intertwine
And the beat of our hearts synchronize into an unspoken melody—filled with the resonating sound of hello goodbye and everything inbetween.
Our private language is exchanged between our gazes in the rich silence,
searching for something
not “I want more,”
but something that says “this is enough.”
I want to build a house with you with bricks of words and mutual understanding
We can set up the panes of glass in the windows from the reflection of happiness drawn from our eyes.
We can let the pitter patter of raindrops on the tin roof
Be the symphony we dance to in the still night.
If I could, I’d pull a blanket over our heads.
I’d breathe in the CO₂ you exhale in our proximity
and discover the secrets of our future encoded in each molecule.
The fear is embedded in my smile
it hides in the curvature of my lips when I wonder at what our futures could possibly hold:
walking crosswalks, changing lanes
stop signs and hidden potholes
lucky dimes and angry people
When reality intervenes,
Fear beholds me
that I’ll snag and rip both our hearts to shreds
I feel unsure about my every move.
But I do not want to dwell in pessimism
So I say,
Build a house with me with bricks of words and mutual understanding.
It can be temporary,
Made from sand so that it melts away when the storms come
But we’ll let the pitter patter of rain on the tin roof be the symphony that we dance to
And draw the happiness from our eyes into the panes of glass
I’ll paint over my all my demons—speckled on the walls—with a paintbrush
Shades of cheerful yellow and gold like the rays of the blinding sun.
I’ll paint over the reality and sadness and fear
So that when I unzip my smile,
You’ll still see the happiness written on my teeth
And amusement in the depth of my eyes.
So I say,
Build a house with me
With bricks of words and happiness written on the glass.
Hold me close.
I’ll breathe in your CO₂ in our proximity,
And discover the secrets of our future encoded in each molecule.
When I Go Off To College
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I’m going to starve to death
because I can’t cook
But it’s okay
because there are things called meal plans
I’m going to have to find an official cuddle buddy
because I need to be constantly loved and held
It’s going to be alright
because their are things such as best friends
I’m going to hate not having one million mirrors in my room
Life is good
because you’ll know you’re beautiful
even if you don’t look at your own reflection
It’s going to be weird
because when I leave my keys on the counter,
they’re not going to move unless I touch them
You’ll know where everything is
And my father won’t be there to ask me if I want hot
cocoa with milk—the way I hate it—when I’m sick
You won’t be alone
And no one’s going to know how to decode my
garble when I talk with my mouth full
So.
I’m going to have to buy my own toilet paper
—and it’s going to be expensive
Don’t.
I won’t see my family for six months
Be.
And it’s going to be hard to say goodbye
Afraid.
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Poetry is a very personal genre because it deals with raw emotion and explicit imagery, yet it is organized in a way that still utilizes rhetorical strategy.
I write poems to channel out my emotions. Most of them will never see the light of day. But I write other poems that rely on the freedom of form, repetition, and formatting to explore a particular concept. The two poems linked below do just that—use rhetorical strategies to convey and preserve emotions.
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