I wish I was good at spoken word because I love it

I stay awake all night listening to it; I aspire to do it

I cry to the pain that others experience I sympathize with them

No, I empathize with them because every time I try to write one

I think what’s gone wrong in my life I sit there for hours

okay well minutes, okay well minute pondering

I write and rewrite and then read and reread and edit those poems that are too short for spoken word

they’re about things like depression, but not my depression

and suicide, but not my suicide

and parties that I wasn’t invited to

and life, but a life I don’t live

and perhaps that’s why I can’t write spoken word

because I write about what I don’t feel and wish I had

I wish I had the strength to write about my rapist because that makes a good poem

and I wish my dad never came back because another poem about absentee black father’s sounds good

and I wish my parents’ drug abuse affected my life because broken households sound depressing enough for poetry

I wish I actually slept with my Spanish teacher from freshman year because well he was hot and steamy relationships, I mean forbidden love is poetic on its own ask Shakespeare about it

I wish I was raped at that party I was so wasted at because drunken rape is problem and I could speak about it

but most of all I wish I could let go of this stigma

spoken word isn’t all what the fuck is wrong with society

some of it is this is what I feel so fuck off

But FUCK! why can’t I write it?

I write things that sound poetic enough like:

With blood falling from my wrists

and tears from my eyes

I’ve written dark thoughts between the lines

I only want to be happy, but I’m locked inside a cage

The bars are made of rumors, lies and sadness

It is locked with defeat

I can smell hope on the other side of the room,

but the path is lined with suicide

but I don’t feel that, my suicidal thoughts come from me not sleeping enough and giving up and saying if I were dead I could sleep forever, but

the problem with my suicide poetry is it rhymes in heroic couplets actually or is about nature because poetry is pretty right?

Have you ever heard pretty suicide poetry? Well if not here’s some:

A smile is a front everyone has learned to put on

Like the sun comes up at dawn

it is no longer happiness, but repetition

We look to the bat of conformity

we look to authority

and they simply will bludgeon

This idea, this idea of happiness

 

Pain is something; everyone has learned to feel

Like leaves on a tree in Autumn begin to peel

it is no longer evil, but euphoric

We look to the drug of conformity

we look to authority

and bashed is it with a brick

This idea, this idea of evil

 

When I think of my own life it's not nearly as poetic, I'm just normal. A poem about what I actually feel it would go like this:

 

7:00 her alarm rings, she hits snooze

7:05 her alarm rings, she hits snooze

7:10 her alarm rings, she hits snooze

7:30 her alarm rings, she hits snooze

8:00 her alarm rings, she hits snooze

8:15 her alarm rings, she realizes it’s time to leave the house...she hits snooze

8:25 she frantically rushes out of bed so she won’t be late

8:36 she is going to be late, but she stops for food anyways

8:51 she sits in her car inhaling her bagel, she’s late

 

I am this girl; I am the girl that hits snooze on the alarm telling her to leave the house

the girl that pretends her life is fine, but fights to stay in her dream world,

the girl that is still the innocent princess her father thinks she is

the girl that would rather dream than face reality

because the reality is, she’s not innocent or a princess,

She’s not the girl her father raised…

her father didn’t even raise her,

TV sex and murder raised her,

book sex and murder raised her,

news rape and murder raised her.

 

In her dream world, she is still the innocent princess her father thinks she is,

she doesn’t know the difference between a tire swing and a noose,

the noose doesn’t exist

she doesn’t know the difference between a jump rope and a weapon,

weapons don’t exist

to her being high is being on that tire swing,

drugs don’t exist

to her, a time out is the worst punishment,

jails don’t exist

the most of her body anyone will ever see is a bathing suit,

she will never know that goodbyes last longer than tomorrows,

she will never know that plants aren’t the only things that die

she’s not even a woman yet

there is no yet, in her dream world she will never become a woman

 

In the real world, she is a like a wildfire in Yellowstone

both beautiful and tragic

she has been raised knowing that as a woman she must always check her drink,

never walk into questionable places alone,

never pull off the road in the middle of the night,

always have a charged cell phone,

never trust a man who says they love you,

never trust a man knows the definition of “no.”

never set down your crown, because every man wants your kingdom,

She was raised knowing that men put down women for a reason.

Women are both beautiful and tragic,

both strong and vulnerable,

both confident and coy,

women are raised to be queens, and yet she can’t be the innocent princess her father thought she was,

she is a warrior, trying to assassinate her own image,

thinking that ghosts are harder to kill,

she blames her mother for not being there, not teaching her about the world,

she was raised on TV sex and murder

book sex and murder,

news rape and murder

and yet she cannot murder reality to stay in her dream world.