Poetry

Again, we piled onto the couches

Facing each other

The librarians told us to keep it down.

Again, we talked and laughed

Learned all the new drama

Caught up to each other's summer lives

I look at the empty kiddie pool in my backyard

In the Midwest summer

My friends used to come to my house

So they could all get in it,

But they don’t like to swim much anymore

Lifejacket strung on the clothes line,

Still dripping with lakewater and smiles

From when I skied across the great

Puddle of light that sits in front of me now,

I looked in the mirror

And today

Instead of focusing on my flaws

On picking out everything I hate about my face

Instead of being my own worst enemy and self-critic

I looked

Really looked

At this girl

At the beginning of the year,

I lost myself

So completely

To the crushing waves of despair,

Hopelessness,

Sadness,

I am always angry

But usually I can put my anger away

This girl

Takes every conversation

By storm

Walks in

Not like she owns it

But like she knows what she wants

And there is no way around it

She will have it

This girl

Fighting

her mail and packages

stacked up

like she’s gone on vacation

like she’ll be back to pick it up

i bet if the postman knew

that the house is forever empty

he would throw it away

like it meant nothing

yesterday 
to you i was nine years old 
with a black hurley hat 
that never left my head 
the hat that you would take 
and try to hold it far above 
my reach knowing i could never get it 

Moving on is different for everyone, and eventually, you’ll never think of them again.

Is what I hear from everyone.

where do ripples come from

i wonder

these little 

escalating things 

perhaps they come from

the speed boat 

a few paces out 

sharp short

and jagged 

or maybe 

Now that it's summer

the museum I live almost next to always has a concert going on

sometime around 5 going to 9:30

the bass inside of my ears

as I try

and fail

to fall asleep.

It was the time of year

when it was summer

but it wasn't miserably hot

wasn't disgustingly humid

it was the perfect in-between

the Goldilocks zone of summer.

It was a double camping trip

my family