literary soliloquy

it used to be my favorite place on Earth,

until recently.

I could spend hours

running my fingers across

the spines of the works

of Blake, Dickinson, Keats, Whitman.

sitting Indian style with the

words of Atwood in my lap

"I would like to be the air

that inhabits you for a moment

only. I would like to be that unnoticed

& that necessary."

laying in the fetal position

nestled with Neruda's very soul

put on paper held in my fingertips

"I love you as certain dark things

are to be loved, in secret,

between, the shadow and the soul."

Plath and I were blood sisters.

Kerouac and I, lovers in a former life.

yet, now it just brings me great sorrow,

so I stand at the edge remembering;

goodbye poetry section of Barnes and Noble.

I cannot bring myself to take a single step,

closer to the past and what might have been.

instead, I drink the ink from this pen,

as I watch the magic of this sacred place dwindle

and I download everything I need to my Kindle.

hAiKu

stubborn hearts rebelled;

sorrowful thoughts beheld;

memories are dwelled.

snake

 my skin is dry and peeling

perhaps I am shedding like a snake

to turn into something

or someone else

yet maybe I am just casting off

my previous idiosyncrasies

I do not pretend to be beautiful,

or particularly interesting,

or intriguing

I know that I am strange,

most likely lacking in common sense,

with an abundance of knowledge from books,

but not from actually living

the smallest gestures often make my day,

the things that others do not take the time to notice

beauty is in the most obscure places, if we could just unplug

long enough to actually look around

I am often told that I remind someone of someone else

either I have multiple doppelgangers

or my face is simple and not quite

enough to remember or entirely forget

I am a snake

what you see today might

look entirely different tomorrow

unless you think you have the

nerve to get under my skin

as I hiss and shake my little tail