credit cards

My wallet is filled with gift cards
That only have fifty cents left
yet too valuable to throw away
Punch cards disregarded
Receipts lay bottomless as
my youth became so guarded

My lungs are filled with chlorine 
Gotta wear SPF 100 sunscreen
unless I burn
Enjoy the sun, before the rain pours
adult issues I’m trying to ignore

Stay awake
Stay guarded
Don’t show emotions
That’s how this shit started
To go downhill at
two hundred miles an hour
Too young to know I
couldn’t do this without her
e

ellenb

NY

YWP Alumni

More by ellenb

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  • By ellenb

    Fear of existence

    I go outside –
    I fear the strangers
    staring 
    watching
    judging
    waiting.

    I stay inside –
    I fear my father
    staring
    watching
    judging
    waiting.

    It seems like it will never end.

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  • By ellenb

    Suffocation

    I am the annoying weed that sticks out through the pavement,
    that messes up perfectly paved sidewalks,
    and makes you trip when you are not looking down.
    I am pretty-
    daffodils and dandelions and appealing and funny.
    I am ugly-

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  • Poetry

    By ellenb

    atheist

    Did you make me not believe? 
    By design?
    By anguish?
    You, the divine creator,
    how could you make me this way?
    Question
    after
    Question.
    And yet you never answer because
    I know
    you do not exist,

    Read More