Dispensable.

I am not dispensable.
Not a piece of junk you can just throw away.
Nor an old paper napkin
Dirty and torn
Stained
Meaningless.
No.
That is not me.
I am not a temporary distraction
I am not your toy.
And I refuse
To play
Your game.
No,
Not anymore.
I cannot allow you to take
Your soft rubber stamp
Dip it into that permanent
Crimson red ink
And brand my forehead
"Second Best"
Right there.
Stamped on my face
Then scratched into my arms
Sewn onto my throat
Etched onto the surface of my eye.
You think it brings me pleasure?
To love you with all that I am
And see you stand by me
But never next to me
Meanwhile all I see is blurred
Blurred by the etching of your words.
"Disposable"
"Dispensable"
"Not quite good enough"
I can't just forget it
I can't let it go.
I cannot stay here on the sidelines
Taking the backseat in my own life
Invisible
Unnoticed
I will not be second best
It hurts me
With a pain I cannot quite describe
Every breath I take
Shakes. Strains.
Struggles
Against the oppressing chains you have bound me in
Suffocating my neck
That chain
Made up link by link
Of lie
After lie
After lie.
And every beat
Of my weakened and yearning heart
S l o w s .
Fa lters.
quiets
Bleeds.
From the gaping hole
That now exists
From the hacking and slicing
That your words have caused
Can you see it now?
Can you see how I bleed?
How my frame shakes with pain
I am worth so much more
So much more than this
This torturous injury
I am more important
Than your secondary label
I cannot be just
Just
The backup plan.
I will not be used
I refuse to be unneeded.
If I am not enough
I will simply
Go.
I will clear out my small
And forgotten place in your heart
Making room for another
Who can fulfill all your needs
I will not return
To this hellish ordeal
You will move on
With only perhaps
A blink
At my departure
My absence might touch you
But it will not move shake you.
But
I will be
free.
From you. And the pain
That you've caused
And you?
You will stay here.

Alone.

So how
please tell me how
are you supposed to



smile and nod




When your 3 someones

arestabbing
your



h
eart

...


?

Vent.

I'm tired.
Yes, physically tired. But more so emotionally.
It's difficult to come to terms with things sometimes. Especially the things that you know will break your heart. The things that you bottle up because you're too afraid you'll offend or hurt someone else.
The things that eat you inside out.
Usually, it's the stupid things. The little things. The things that you feel like you can't bring into the light because they won't be important enough. You will be petty. Foolish. Nobody wants to be foolish.
Nobody.
I feel like nobody lately. Which is absolutely ridiculous and I know that.
I'm not looking for pity. Or advice. I just need to get it all out.
Cause I'm not me anymore. Too much... stuff... eating away at me. I'm just left with a bitter empty shell. And I hate that.
I'm tired of it all. Feeling so unneeded. It's awful. Feeling replaced, invisible. The one people forget to invite or don't want around. My best friends don't even need me. They love me, I know that. But they don't NEED me. I'm not necessary.
And that's okay.
It's just difficult.

Happiness.

This is the best thing I've ever written. Maybe not the best in the sense of beauty or writing style. It's a rhyming poem... so it has that little kid air about it.
But the message.
The message is something I need to read everyday.

Happiness.

When you get out of bed

in the brightness of morn

be grateful, be happy

let your whole life transform

get up and get out

do some good in the world
be a person you love

watch the sunshine unfurl

lend a hand, do what's right

joke with your friends

let them love your heart
and the message it sends

and when you crawl back in bed

in the darkness of night

think back on your day

on those things you did right
because in the end 

time is a thief
and we lose more than we know

when we focus on grief

be the person who cares

live each day to the max

smile too much, laugh too hard

map out days by good acts

think of all the things you can achieve

and after all that... 


just lay there and breathe.

Old. But still applicable.

You (and) Me

Why can't you see 

You (should) want me 

I look at you (longingly) 

But you never see me 

Waiting (always) so patiently 

For you (finally)
to agree 
(with me)

that we

-you and me 
are (simply) meant to be
...can you even hear me?

Hear my (silent) plea?

I know you long to be free

But [I] just [want you] to see

That my heart still beats (achingly)

For you to be

The (only) one for me

And I ask (cautiously)

Why do you always see

Things as "you" OR "me"

As though things won't (ever) be

Seen as "us" and "we"

I've thought of questions (regretfully)

And I (think) 'm (slowly)

Beginning to see

That "we" will not (cannot) ever be

But (for now) I will wait for you (patiently)

And I ask your answer (in complete honesty)

Why can't you

Why won't you

Why don't you see

That out of he, we, and she

You (should) want me.

Nothing.

(Warning. This has absolutely nothing to do with anything. I've been in a weird mood lately. So this is completely nonsense and has nothing to do with ANYONE or ANYTHING. Keep that in mind.)

I gave it to you freely.
No thought of the consequence.
It was simple.
But symbolic.
As is everything in this life.
You took it hesitantly.
And we walked on.
The road we traveled was a ribbon of moonlight
And I trembled as we passed along it
Like a leaf in a storm
Fearful of what lay ahead.
We talked of life
The brilliance of cloudless days
The color of lollipops
I danced to the rhythm of a child's laugh
You soaked in the sunlight bouncing off the rim of the ocean
It was easy.
Far easier than I had expected.
The distance between us fell away
Melted into the shimmering past
Fading and blurring then sharpening again
Behind us
But not far.
You held onto it
My gift I had given
Loosely
Not gripping tightly like I would have with yours.
You weren't comfortable holding it
You ached to drop it in the sand
And bury it
But you were aware of me
That I was there
That I was watching you
Studying you.
We walked on
Past the lines and the signs
We fell off the earth
I held onto your hand
Ah, yes the first time
That I had touched you at all
To me, it was everything.
Right then
For one brief moment
I held onto the sun.
And you tolerated me
Let me save you from the sky
That deep immersing space that you could not escape
As the world span around us
Trying to right us again.
I did not breathe
Holding onto you like that
I could not breathe
I was afraid that one small intake
Of the clouded air
Would give me the weight to fall back to the ground.
You looked at me
For the first time
In my eyes
And you saw past their color
Gray.
And you saw me
You gasped in surprise
And dropped my hand
As though it scalded you
And I fell to the earth.
Then we were.
You. So far above me.
And me. Face first on the floor of reality.
The black and white tiles of life.
I sobbed
Wanting you
And you screamed
Wanting anything but me.
I reached for you.
To pull you to me.
Before the sky consumed you
And you were gone forever.
And you looked at me
And put your hand forth
My eyes stretched
As my hopes rang out like bells
Filling all the space of my mind
I reached out for you
And you pulled me close
My own eyes pleaded with me
Don't forget this moment.
And you grabbed my hand
And dropped it back in it.
You rocketed towards the sky
Falling into it's pattern
The onward stretching motions catching you in their spell
And I looked down
In my own open palm
And closed my fingers around it
My heart.
And as I closed my fingers.
There was nothing.

A US History Project.

Karina Gillette

Mrs. Flanagan

U.S. History

3-20-09

A Dream

I am not a speaker.

Or a poet or a thinker.

I have but small thoughts,

None of which could change the very fabric of this earth.

What I have is simple.

I simply have a dream.

My dream is all of me.

A key to the doors of the chambers of my heart.

An opening for my aspirations to flow out from my inner core

Absorbing into my skin

Forming the surface which coats my body.

I do not dream for much.

But my dream is like a rainbow

Bright with colored stripes

Layers of different intensity

But similar in their form.

I dream for the world.

A world so much different from the world we have known.

A world in which we don’t fear

Where we can have children without fearing for their lives.

As they walk one block to their school

A world in which there is no reason to distrust the policeman more than the murderer behind bars.

A world that screams out for less

Instead of more.

A world that gives like it takes.

One which has soaked up so much light from the sun

That it radiates light back

Filling every dark corner of the great universe with its glow

And still having light left over to saturate our needy souls.

I dream for my home.

A place which I can call a haven

Where my husband and I don’t have to watch each other

Drenching our pillows with tears

Never having to watch the lines of wisdom and age appear instantaneously along our young children’s foreheads.

I want eternity.

A life that I can count on.

And then some.

I dream that my children will know of suffering.

Know of it, but not know it.

I want to catch that strange warmth

That you feel when you’re small

And seeing for the first time

The ripples in a glassy pond.

I want to take that feeling

And spread ripples of my own.

Influence my children

Influence the world.

Not change it

No not me.

But I want to see another change it.

Someone I’ve touched by a ripple emanating from me.

From my heart.

From my dream.

I dream for me.

That I might have courage.

That I might feel love.

I dream that I have the strength to do my part in this shaken world.

I long for the day

In which I can just breathe.

Yes, I have dream.

And it is because I dream.

That I am.