Answers

I check the mailbox
twice a day for a message
of something better than
i need you. There's only
so much bad news a person
can handle.

I jump
at the toaster's elevation
of my bagel.
Another morning,
another thought,
thoughts.

Remember
Black Friday?
And today is just a Friday
like a Monday; waiting
for it to end while
knowing:
This is the beginning.

I need someone
who doesn't need me.
There's only so many
tears my shoulder
can take
before,
a tsunami, like guilt,
like it not being enough.

Alarm clocks,
set multiple times
because I'd rather sleep
than have a nightmare
called reality.

Are you depressed? 
A loaded question,
and I shoot back.

There are no
answers.

Oregon Students of Color Coalition Conference

So I am at OSCC Conference in Eugene (GO DUCKS). This conference has been amazing! The workshops have been enlightening and inspiring. I went to one about the Student Alliance Project. This workshop talked about using poetry, spoken word, and rap as an outlet for youth. We wrote a poem during the workshop using the prompt "I am from". It was meant to be something very personal. This was the outcome.

I am from Auschwitz and Heil Hitlers:
the strength it took to run away.
I am from the girl in the skirt.
The girl you can't flirt with because
she's too much of a ___ word my mom
said not to say. I am.
From laughing to crying to being too
emotional to not enough. I am
the Christian girl with roots deep
in the Hebrew language; so deep
that I have to start at Hebrew 101:
Aleph, Bet, Gimel, Dalet. Hay. Hey,
to friends that don't quite get the ambition
controlling me. I am from being ambitious
enough for success, but not relationships.
I am from breaking stereotypes about big
noses and matching pocket books. I am
from siblings that make me laugh and a life
that makes me cry. I am from a clock,
ticking too quickly.

Slow. Down. I have not had the chance
to say, I am from:

Travel.
Love stronger than the hard place.
From making the impact
you won't forget.

Slow. Down. I am from
running so quick to get it all done,
never feeling like it's enough.

Love Poem

I’ve never written a love poem.

Only like poems, that speak of some

days and other years and anything

but the now. But right now I’m writing

for the hope of love, the depth of it

wondering what exactly it is, like is this it?

Things I'm Not Allowed to Write About

Things like hot chocolate
sipped with secret words.
The only time I let a man
pay for my food. Laughter
heard through phone reception,
pain ignored through
phone reception.

But if I could,
I would
remind of summer
nights spent with the taste
of salty water sliding into
my mouth, slipping onto
wrinkled pillow cases.

Years later, with best
wishes but still wondering
which intrapersonal defect
led to the rejection lingering
like a domino effect.

If that was love,
counting my losses and walking
lonely, but not alone. Shrugged,
drooped, aching shoulders
and writing inside the boundaries.

Salty water reunited with pillowcase.