I guess this is kind of a cop-out, cause I wrote all of this years ago. I thought all of my -Resque- poetry was lost, but I stumbled upon an old computer of mine in my parents basement last week. I know there's a few people around here that have expressed regret about me deleting everything I wrote from the board, and I guess, a few years later, I feel the same. So here's a few I cared about the most.
on perfection
Saw you last night-
And I got this hole in my heart and
it looks like it would just about fit the words you said to me
as you were leaving.
I could stand here and wave goodbye
or I could just turn the corner- dance
naked in the rain.
You make me feel like a kid again
You look at me like I could be the death of everything you hold sacred.
You make me feel that everything I ever did wrong was for a reason
I've been feeling this way for years
Could you take some of my pain? My inner turmoil, my reasons for living?
You can hold onto them for a while and they can rot you instead.
Better you than me.
But around you, I can't seem to remember
that I hate myself that I hate my life that I hate you.
So the next time you come around
(to my jungle to my deserted alley to my nothingness)
Could you check your purity at the door?
Because I sure as hell don't feel like dealing with it today.
And if you look at me that way one more time
(your grin your hair your eyes)
God knows what I'm going to do.
So fuck you and your sincerity and your love for the whole human race and your innocence and your idealism. To hell with your wonderful ways and your caring kindness and your perfection. I could care less about your causes and your Christianity and your standards.
You are so utterly brilliant and I am nothing that you need.
------------------------------------
Bethany
Lately, I've been content to sit in the shadow of you
and listen to your talk of brilliant, breakable things.
you have a fucking amazing shadow, Bethany.
seriously, it gets so dark back here
that I can’t see your face
(let alone my own)
god, I love you for that.
you don’t come around for me as often as you used to.
am I not the audience I once was?
the most I ever get from you is a scattered song
sung at two in the morning
on a borrowed guitar.
nine times out of ten I’m left wanting
at least 39 percent more.
Last night I managed to capture a fleeting part of you.
Butterfly soft, and gone too soon.
I was laying in your bed,
you had taken the guitar
so I could gaze at your hair while you played.
(I only knew the one song, anyway)
you didn't know I was watching you,
and after a while I wasn’t.
I closed my eyes, simply listening
to the singing of your life.
It’s times like these
that I realize why I stick around.
Few and far between
but worth the price I pay with my soul.
Love tempered with fear, and anticipation.
Your words took me back to last year,
when I lived for you and occasional glimpses
of your passionate reality.
The moment overtook you and the music stopped.
I opened my eyes to watch you cry.
Silent witness to your longing.
Sometimes life is so intense.
---------------------------------
60 and Still Waiting
When I was thirteen, I knew that I would grow up to become
a famous writer, a poet, an author.
I cut my hair short
and my mother made me get a perm
and I got the feeling that I wasn't living the right kind of life.
When I was fifteen, I told myself
that there was still time.
Time to grow into someone else:
someone who would set the world on fire.
I sat quietly, waiting for it to come.
Not too much later, I got tired of waiting,
I lost my virginity to the wrong person
and decided that drinking was the way to go.
I lost too many nights to being someone I didn't recognize at all.
When I was eighteen, I left home.
I didn't go far, but I was convinced it was far enough
to leave myself behind and truly begin my life.
My nights were filled with coffee and drugs
and long, philosophical conversations about
absolutely nothing at all.
I was pretty sure I was getting closer.
If I could just stumble upon the right combination of words
things would take off.
I tried many combinations and nothing took off.
When I was 22 I graduated from college.
I knew this time, that this was the moment
when everything would change.
If the right people would read it,
if the right person would love me,
if the right chance came along.
At 23 I'm still waiting.
It's starting to get cold here
and I can't kick the habit
and I can't seem to find the right chance,
or the right person,
or the right moment.
The right combinations are still eluding me.
And every night I pray that I won't
be sixty and still waiting.
----------------------------------
You woke up one morning, and started:
packing a suitcase filled with (mistaken emotions)
cast-off sweaters.
You were always wanting me to search for the
deeper meaning in your speech patterns.
(Obviously I never searched hard enough)
You always wished I would stop listening
to what you were saying,
and start feeling
the genius in the empty spaces in between.
I felt you walk out the door
from my birds-eye view in the soundproof, lightproof
cage I was lying in.
I have reached enlightenment.
My thoughts are fraught with deeper meaning
and I stopped talking
three and a half decades ago.
My hands are now perfectly tied.
I've begun to assimilate our entire history.
Flashing by in moments of beauty.
Soon, I will set it to music.
It will be entirely inaudible,
and sung in a language that no one speaks.
-----------------------------
walking to bathrooms
I’ve lived long enough in this world to know:
look down while walking to bathrooms...
Earlier today:
I stand in my room-
(surrounded by my own dirty laundry, I)
borrow my roommate’s thin pinkandgreen Abercrombie shirt.
It is pulled on over my naked skin without a second thought.
Grab my bag, and-
out the door late, I meet the world.
Hours and three Diet Cokes later:
(Never before has the bathroom seemed this far away)
I look down to realize:
it’s cold in here.
My nipples and I walk to the bathroom.
I’m not sure whether to look at the ground,
or the walls,
or the men sitting in the corner booth.
Three of them,
greasy, and cigarette-smoking,
dark-eyed, and decked out in their finest
black leather; mullets galore.
Halfway there: I lift my head,
and engage in a staring contest with the dirtiest of the three.
His eyes narrow, as his friends quickly look down,
(a cross between ashamed and amused,)
into their plates of hash browns.
In the bathroom:
I stare into the mirror,
flush-faced, and annoyed.
It’s even colder in here,
ensuring another fun-filled traipse across the restaurant.
I sit down to pee as my head drops into my hands,
steeling myself.
As I leave the bathroom,
my jiggling breasts serve as a reminder:
keep your eyes down girl,
or you’ve asked for trouble tonight.
(I always was the type to make contact; trouble.)
on perfection
Saw you last night-
And I got this hole in my heart and
it looks like it would just about fit the words you said to me
as you were leaving.
I could stand here and wave goodbye
or I could just turn the corner- dance
naked in the rain.
You make me feel like a kid again
You look at me like I could be the death of everything you hold sacred.
You make me feel that everything I ever did wrong was for a reason
I've been feeling this way for years
Could you take some of my pain? My inner turmoil, my reasons for living?
You can hold onto them for a while and they can rot you instead.
Better you than me.
But around you, I can't seem to remember
that I hate myself that I hate my life that I hate you.
So the next time you come around
(to my jungle to my deserted alley to my nothingness)
Could you check your purity at the door?
Because I sure as hell don't feel like dealing with it today.
And if you look at me that way one more time
(your grin your hair your eyes)
God knows what I'm going to do.
So fuck you and your sincerity and your love for the whole human race and your innocence and your idealism. To hell with your wonderful ways and your caring kindness and your perfection. I could care less about your causes and your Christianity and your standards.
You are so utterly brilliant and I am nothing that you need.
------------------------------------
Bethany
Lately, I've been content to sit in the shadow of you
and listen to your talk of brilliant, breakable things.
you have a fucking amazing shadow, Bethany.
seriously, it gets so dark back here
that I can’t see your face
(let alone my own)
god, I love you for that.
you don’t come around for me as often as you used to.
am I not the audience I once was?
the most I ever get from you is a scattered song
sung at two in the morning
on a borrowed guitar.
nine times out of ten I’m left wanting
at least 39 percent more.
Last night I managed to capture a fleeting part of you.
Butterfly soft, and gone too soon.
I was laying in your bed,
you had taken the guitar
so I could gaze at your hair while you played.
(I only knew the one song, anyway)
you didn't know I was watching you,
and after a while I wasn’t.
I closed my eyes, simply listening
to the singing of your life.
It’s times like these
that I realize why I stick around.
Few and far between
but worth the price I pay with my soul.
Love tempered with fear, and anticipation.
Your words took me back to last year,
when I lived for you and occasional glimpses
of your passionate reality.
The moment overtook you and the music stopped.
I opened my eyes to watch you cry.
Silent witness to your longing.
Sometimes life is so intense.
---------------------------------
60 and Still Waiting
When I was thirteen, I knew that I would grow up to become
a famous writer, a poet, an author.
I cut my hair short
and my mother made me get a perm
and I got the feeling that I wasn't living the right kind of life.
When I was fifteen, I told myself
that there was still time.
Time to grow into someone else:
someone who would set the world on fire.
I sat quietly, waiting for it to come.
Not too much later, I got tired of waiting,
I lost my virginity to the wrong person
and decided that drinking was the way to go.
I lost too many nights to being someone I didn't recognize at all.
When I was eighteen, I left home.
I didn't go far, but I was convinced it was far enough
to leave myself behind and truly begin my life.
My nights were filled with coffee and drugs
and long, philosophical conversations about
absolutely nothing at all.
I was pretty sure I was getting closer.
If I could just stumble upon the right combination of words
things would take off.
I tried many combinations and nothing took off.
When I was 22 I graduated from college.
I knew this time, that this was the moment
when everything would change.
If the right people would read it,
if the right person would love me,
if the right chance came along.
At 23 I'm still waiting.
It's starting to get cold here
and I can't kick the habit
and I can't seem to find the right chance,
or the right person,
or the right moment.
The right combinations are still eluding me.
And every night I pray that I won't
be sixty and still waiting.
----------------------------------
You woke up one morning, and started:
packing a suitcase filled with (mistaken emotions)
cast-off sweaters.
You were always wanting me to search for the
deeper meaning in your speech patterns.
(Obviously I never searched hard enough)
You always wished I would stop listening
to what you were saying,
and start feeling
the genius in the empty spaces in between.
I felt you walk out the door
from my birds-eye view in the soundproof, lightproof
cage I was lying in.
I have reached enlightenment.
My thoughts are fraught with deeper meaning
and I stopped talking
three and a half decades ago.
My hands are now perfectly tied.
I've begun to assimilate our entire history.
Flashing by in moments of beauty.
Soon, I will set it to music.
It will be entirely inaudible,
and sung in a language that no one speaks.
-----------------------------
walking to bathrooms
I’ve lived long enough in this world to know:
look down while walking to bathrooms...
Earlier today:
I stand in my room-
(surrounded by my own dirty laundry, I)
borrow my roommate’s thin pinkandgreen Abercrombie shirt.
It is pulled on over my naked skin without a second thought.
Grab my bag, and-
out the door late, I meet the world.
Hours and three Diet Cokes later:
(Never before has the bathroom seemed this far away)
I look down to realize:
it’s cold in here.
My nipples and I walk to the bathroom.
I’m not sure whether to look at the ground,
or the walls,
or the men sitting in the corner booth.
Three of them,
greasy, and cigarette-smoking,
dark-eyed, and decked out in their finest
black leather; mullets galore.
Halfway there: I lift my head,
and engage in a staring contest with the dirtiest of the three.
His eyes narrow, as his friends quickly look down,
(a cross between ashamed and amused,)
into their plates of hash browns.
In the bathroom:
I stare into the mirror,
flush-faced, and annoyed.
It’s even colder in here,
ensuring another fun-filled traipse across the restaurant.
I sit down to pee as my head drops into my hands,
steeling myself.
As I leave the bathroom,
my jiggling breasts serve as a reminder:
keep your eyes down girl,
or you’ve asked for trouble tonight.
(I always was the type to make contact; trouble.)
