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Pictures Turned Askew
I am a contradiction
an unforseen complication--
an unwise compiliation
of bitter brudges burned,
of nonsense words re-etched
into scarred skin,
and secrets whisper-thin
and all the twisted tales you spin
from thin air up through
coiled pens,
from where the crumbling sidewalk ends
and far below, the river bends
I am an earthquake
the way the ground shakes
rumbling under soft bare feet
breaking the hardened concrete
and releasing fire into the street
a forest blaze collecting trees
hissing red sparks beneath their leaves
an angry snake to sputter up
his smoking lips to sweeter cups
I am dropped silverware
scattered beneath where we might care
shattered glass fell everywhere,
memories of handlebars
of candied wax and wagon cars
of ghosts from stories long ago told
secrets to vaporized to hold
I am not
anything I wished to be
wrote about or yearned to see,
I am not a pretty kiss
blown from a mother's painted lips
or flowers split through braided hair
or all the ways I was taught to care
and all too often I am too much to bear
too much to hug or love or desire
because these are memories that hurt to inquire
of skinned knees, burned elbows and skin
leave me screaming, starving, thin,
believing all I could ever own
would come from holding on to sin
I am melting candle wax
mending bleeding stabbed backs
trying to learn to read thick books
beneath the shade of pine tree nooks
devastation of a shadowy kind
and a hollow stairway to a frozen mind
as I become less
I feel that I am more
I am seams ripping open sores
wishing they could reach my core
leaning upon liars
and rum-beaten lips
caught in the middle
of fast sinking ships
I am not
all I believed to be worthy
not all I was taught was true
or how I learned to feel power
or all pictures turned askew
I am still being taught
on various pages
that all I've done wrong, yet despite,
I still perhaps might be alright.
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Inspired by a piece my girlfriend wrote, I know this could not live up to her talent but it feels like me nonetheless.