She'll Benefit From Me

In my life
You are now one of them

One of the boys
Who will find a girl he really loves
And never tell her about me

And if your memory
Speaks more quickly than your common sense
You'll cover your tracks
By telling her how much better she is
Than me

But she
A beneficiary of
What may be
The wrong or right
Circumstance

And I was the girl who you just wanted to love
The girl who stuck around too long
To teach you how to grow up

Just so that someone could benefit
From the time that I put in

And it doesn't hurt anymore

Because I won't be her anymore
I can't be her anymore

"The only thing harder than walking away, was realizing that you would never come after me."
unknown

Tired

I desire to express myself
And know that it is alright to feel

Would you let me be tired?
Exhausted
With loving
Doing the right thing
Falling short

It drains me
And I go to sleep
Alone

I still feel like that girl

The easy catch
Cheap date

It gets hard to fight her
When everything in my life
Tells me that she's so near to me

And when I try to require that people do the right thing
In regards to me

They leave

Sometimes
It's exhausting
Being me

Unsaid

Sometimes I think
You will be the last boy to love me

Sometimes
I just think
That this life is not a series of accidents

And there is a reason that you were in my life
So shortly

I just want to talk to you

"The bitterest tears shed over graves are for words left unsaid and deeds left undone."
Harriet Beecher Stowe

Train

I'll call you...
A search engine for a soul mate

Perfect.

This is where I lay

Between finding me

And hoping that someone else will too

It is good to be free
Like sitting in a train station
Alone
For the first time
And asking the train to take me
Anywhere

It is that feeling

Perfectly.

I don't know where this train is taking me
But I believe in bigger things

For a moment... it was mine.

So simple
And full of memories

Seemingly unknowing
Today, I put on the ring you gave me
And looked at it remembering
How much it meant to me

The beauty of 10 short lived days
Of thinking
That things were going to turn out
The way I thought they should be

Silly me

And now...

I wonder if this ring will stay with me

Or if it will get lost in between couch cushions
Behind my dresser
Or in my luggage at the airport

And if it does will someone else pick it up
Without ever knowing
What it meant to me
The moment that it nonchalantly became
Mine

Or if it stays

No matter where I find myself

I will smile through a tear
At the memory

Of love and loss...
But love all the same

Things that could have been
Maybe should have been
But will never be

I wonder if I will feel happy
Or the sting...

Rejection

Either way
I know

That I will keep on living
And keep on loving

Because today is always the day
That things get better

Lion and Gazelle

The predator and the prey
Story as old as time
Old as sin

You the ear I had longed for

The gentle hand that I needed

A safe space
You were safe
So welcoming in all of your ways

It was hard to see your mane
Behind your painted face
And me the gazelle flexing my muscles
Forgetting who I was
Really

I was but a gazelle
A child
In need

You a lion
Prancing around like you loved me

And I could feel you touching me
As if my face were lovely
Stepping slowly
Into my heart

And I believed

Right before you snapped
On top of me
Crushing my face
As if you never saw me

And then when I looked in the mirror
It no longer looked liked me

It looked like my longing

Like you

Feathers

Your words fall like feathers

Touching me lightly
Holding no real meaning
There
But forgotten quickly

Your words mean little to me

What to do.

I have a problem.

I used to post everything. I posted ever bit of dark, sad, hopeful, or happy poetry that flowed out of my brain.

But now I keep it to myself.

I'm not sure if I used to be more honest and more childlike (in a good way). I'm not sure if I am now using my blog, which used to be a place of honest openness, to paint myself in a good light. I believe that the God in me shines just as clearly through my suffering as He does through my victories.

If I really believe that than I feel that this should be an honest expression of myself. It should serve the same purpose that it had in the beginning.

Tea Please

It would seem
That I always get caught up in things
Again

Somewhere between all my cups of tea
And the seat that I had been sitting on
For eight hours straight in the same coffee shop

I took a good look at myself
And things were tangled back up

I feel differently
Not like the take my breath away
I need you sort of way

But more so "If this is what you want... okay."

It's the pacifist in me

Or the part that knows

That everyday you beg for me to act this way

I'm winning.

This is the realm that I did not want to enter

These were the tangled

INeedtosortthisout

Sort of thoughts
That I did not want to have to sort through

The deeper
More malicious motives
That I'm doing my best to stay away from

But sometimes I running out of places in my head
To fit all of the excuses
And I'm asking for more room
So, I'm throwing out files by the dozen

I'm out of room
And out of tea
Disaster

I'll just take some black tea, please

These excuses are overrated

Her Beauty

The last few days I have felt that words are stuck inside of me. I can not empty a racing mind onto paper, because nothing comes out right or nothing comes out at all. It is as if I have lost the ability to know what I am thinking/feeling. Here goes a change of subject and attempt number 1,000.

Her beauty was that of ink stained roses
Grace of a dove
With a broken wing
Temperament of an angry goddess
And hope as a fading dream

A smile awakened with the pain of a thousand broken hearts
Haunting her one at a time
But when she found the courage
To muster up a turn of her lips
It was the beauty of a child
All grown up
And still so young
So cold

She walked
Casting snow from her scarf and coat
And spoke
In the fear of growing old
Alone

Jaded and jinxed
She found pleasure in many obscure things
Away from the people who licked their lips
As they stared and her swaying hips

And then the poor unsuspecting boys who knew not of their own desire
She steered clear
To keep them out of her lair

And she knew not of her beauty
Not of the pearls that were buried
Under her walls that she had been building
Quickly

Not of the lies
That had been melted down
Into the fibers of her being
Blending so perfectly
That she could not see them
They looked the same as her skin
Pale and painfully lovely

She wonders if it was worth it
But only in moments
Where she hides in secret
Keeping all of her thoughts
From the light

She wonders if the beauty is gone forever
If it only awakens with the snow
And flowed away
As the sun flowed over a crippled soul

She prays for her beauty
To return
Without the pain

She longs to feel
Her own beauty
And then turn around

To see it reflect
From the glass window

Of restored dreams

Thunder

I miss you like thunder and lightening.

I long for your voice
Like I long for the ocean
On a cool summer afternoon

I remember your hands
Like I remember to play the piano
Every line
A graceful melody

I drew a line for you
I built a canyon for me
And now I see
That there is no going back
I must leave you where you lay
And live praying that I learned
From our childish mistakes

But I wondered today
Like I have a million times
If you still think about me

And if you do
What do you see?

Confession

They say that confession is good for the soul

So, take this tape off my mouth
And let me set my soul free

Let me tell you
How I still use this body to abuse

The ways that I kept the secrets in between the sheets
And let my body scream "take me"

I told you to stay away from me
Until could name how I was feeling
But I sought vengeance before I realized
That I was angry

There was nothing left to loose
So I murdered you
By not saying "no"

I kept enough guilt for the both of us
And secretly I thought that you
Would take your share of the blame from me

Love

I know more now
Than I did then

That You love me
Like master pieces and pleasant dreams

You care about the little things
Like waking after a full night of sleep

You want to see me live
Instead of waiting for life to begin
Like hovering in purgatory

It's the words that I need. It's the way I speak love... not the way I love You but the way that You have to love me. The way that I believe.

I could swear today that Your breath wakes me and puts me to sleep. It's the glasses that help me see the world.

Love

Always speak to me in love.

Imagine

I could imagine
That your smile
Would make my knees weak
Imagine
That your beauty would allow me to rest
When that is what I so desperately need
You will be in your own
And meet me
At the fence
I will not have to talk you into
Loving me
Or have you scale my walls
We will meet in the middle
Your arms will feel safe
And my life will take on a new adventure
You with me

The only thing
That is lacking

Is that I still have to imagine
All of these things

"Happy is the heart that still feels pain
Darkness drains and light will come again
Swing open your chest and let it in
Just let the love, love, love begin."
"Everybody"
Ingrid Michaelson

Find Yourself

I prefer children now
At least they tend to move forward

Adults take their cemented coping and carry it
And right when you think they are moving forward
It's right back to the start

I get exhausted watching people turn back around
To crawl back in the same holes
That got them in the same old messes
Over and over again

I wish I had a delete button
I could just make people disappear from my life
On days like today
When I just can't take it anymore

I despise the evil in the world
The broken promises
And broken hearts

I don't want you anymore

To turn me into a child in all the worse ways
Wiping away my common sense and experience

I just don't have any more shelf room for you
Just won't fit

Find yourself
Outside of everything you know
Set free what you're supposed to be
And then report to another's heart for duty

And I
Just want to be me


"We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others,
that in the end,
we become disguised to ourselves."
Francois de la Roche Foucald

Promises

Begged the rain to fall on broken promises
Maybe if the drops washed the ink away
I could forget that I broke your heart

Begged the ring to fall in the drain
The memories to bury themselves with a sweet abandon
Begged life to be easier for a little girl
Who signed on the dotted line
Without knowing
That she had no ability to hold up a promise of that magnitude

Do I still?
I beg the question
And I seek the answer

I spend my life protecting people from my body
But what about me?
No one's out to protect me
And I do not know how to protect myself

How do I learn to respect a body that I have despised for so long?
I am learning a hard lesson at the throne
On my own
In secret
Where I am keeping
My heart

All At Once

I should get an award for finding the oddest songs that fit my situations so perfectly or are literally what just came out of my mouth. I find a lot of humor in this gift that I seem to possess.

I swear I said this like 2 weeks ago. Oh my life...


"All At Once"
The Fray

There are certain people you just keep coming back to
She is right in front of you
You begin to wonder could you find a better one
Compared to her now she's in question

And all at once the crowd begins to sing
Sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing are the same

Maybe you want her, maybe you need her
Maybe you started to compare to someone not there

Looking for the right one you line up the world to find
Where no questions cross your mind
But she won't keep on waiting for you without a doubt
Much longer for you to sort it out

And all at once the crowd begins to sing
Sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing are the same

Maybe you want her, maybe you need her
Maybe you started to compare to someone not there
Maybe you want it, maybe you need it
Maybe it's all you're running from
Perfection will not come

And all at once the crowd begins to sing
Sometimes
We'd never know what's wrong without the pain
Sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing are the same

Maybe you want her, maybe you need her
Maybe you've started to compare to someone not there
Maybe you want it, maybe you need it
Maybe it's all you're running from
Perfection will not come

Maybe you want her, maybe you need her
Maybe you had her, maybe you lost her to another
To another

Understanding

I need to study, but I am burnt out. So instead, I have been playing all my songs on shuffle to see if I could dance to all of them. Creativity is blooming or being shot down... I can't decide which. I am currently on "Unforgettable" by Nat King Cole, which is probably why I decided to sit down and write a poem. I am terrible at slow dancing, and it feels even more awkward when I'm doing it by myself.

Anyways, that has nothing to do with this poem. I have just been alone all day and I needed someone to talk to (even if it is just a computer screen).

I want to write of pain
That I can not remember
I want something dark and soulful
Somethings that describes a place I have been
With beautiful metaphors
That bring emotions to life
Jumping off of a page and escaping into the imagination
As if I were understood for a split moment

I want to dream of how things would be in a perfect world
Where I wouldn't always have to love people enough to let go
I would be able to keep what I love
And hold on
While life sweeps my into the whirlwind
That is always coming my way
I want to dream

I want to be on earth
Where I understand a reality
That is so far from how things should be
But never completely keeps me from hope

I want to see God face to face
And tell Him all the ways I want to love Him
And all the ways that I do

I want to laugh and cry in the arms of my Maker
Tell Him how upset it makes me sometimes
That my lessons always end in letting go
But how grateful I am
That joy always finds me on the other side
I have loved and I have lost
But losing has never been so beautiful

Nothing can get me down these days
I have a Lover
And He understands me

Mourning

I have declared today a day of mourning. It is not because anyone died, but just because my life is changing. I feel everything changing, and I feel new dreams coming alive in me. It is probably a good change and I am excited to see what God is going to do in my life, but with all change, things or people get lost in transition and sometimes it is good to just take a minute to properly lament all that is lost.

Today I went through many old messages and e-mails. I read things I didn't even remember and some of them were deleted because that needed to be the last time that they were read, and others will be read again so I can remember. Life is always moving so fast that it gets easy to loose things in transition. It gets easy for me to forget where I am from and who got me here. Ultimately Jesus got me where I am today, but He has brought people into my life to lead me here too. It amazes me how well Jesus provides. He knows that we are human and that because He is not with us physically we are physical being and we need people in our lives. There are so many people who have come and gone (and some who are still around) who God used to walk with me, pull me when I needed it, or for me to help up and learn how to really love people for who they are in the process. I feel like I don't always give these people enough credit for the impact that they have had on my life, and I don't always take time to be grateful.

I feel an enormous amount of gratitude right now. I do not feel sad. My heart is just still in remembrance. I miss people and I am not afraid to admit it, but I know that more people are always on their way. It doesn't really matter if things ended badly, we just went separate ways, or they are lifelong, I have learned so much from so many. God has always known who I needed and when I needed them. When I thought I was down and out God always had a bigger plan for me, leading me to Him. God knows that I am human and I need relationships. I need people to laugh with, to cry with, and to share my life with.

I feel people moving out of my life and it pains me. Some of them I thought were life long and others have always been seasonal, but God has truly taught me to love. I used to try to stop loving people so that it would not hurt so bad when they left, but now I know that love is always worth while. Through all this I feel like I have learned to love God so much more and through that love other people and the blessings that they have been in my life.

It's beautiful to grow relationships with people and see all the gifts that God has given them (that if used correctly) make the world a better place. I feel like everywhere I turn I find more amazing people who are being transformed by my loving Father.

I do not know how people live without love. It is liberating to love endlessly, to see all the beauty in people and even to mourn change and loss.

Take My Breath Away

Some need to walk on water
Lay out a fleece
Or put their fingers into His hands and feet

But the only miracle I need to believe
Is to see what God has done in me

I feel older
I feel more complete

I will go places and see bigger and better things
The Lord is doing

I will flatten my heart
And pave a road where there is none to be seen
Because I know where life is taking me
I'm going home
To see my King

I will save this restored body
And this heart filled with dreams
For the one who wants to learn to love
Like Christ has loved me

I will pave a road to my Father
Where my children can follow
And know that this is a safe place to be

I will give all of me

The world is big
And love abounds in the shadows
But I will take it with me
I will never hide Jesus in me
Behind the scars and broken dreams
He is bigger than my failures
Bigger than my disappointments
Greater than all that has hurt me
He is alive in me
Restoring all that was broken
All that was taken

He has made me a person worth loving
A complete person
Worth finding
And when love comes to me
He will love me for my strength
Not because I am fragile
He will never ask me to be less than what I am
He will simply ask for me
The whole version of me
Shining through the darkness
Into a world that looks so beautiful to me

So beautiful

You take my breath away

Painting

The swirling
Of colors bold as day
Take me into a painting
Of many brilliant things
Reminding me that I am living
And my feet are walking slowly
But with direction

The shades blend into a purpose
A final painting
That will hang on the wall of the saints
Looking differently from all the other masterpieces
Sitting in a hall of fame
Glorifying God
One redemption at a time

Take my life
And paint more brilliant things
Letting me sit in wonder at the life I have been given
More vibrant and full of life
Than anything I have ever seen
Illuminating something that is me
But looks so differently than who I thought I would be

I am broken into colors
Like fireworks

I am broken so that I can find restoration
Healing in a painters hand
Rebuilding the scene with every stroke
Keeping me in mind
With every new design

I'm learning to love like red
Have bluish grace
And forgive in green
I am learning many things

Remember Me

Today I want my room
I want my bed
I need my solitude

Today I want to walk around
And be happy that no one knows me
And never give them the chance

I want to walk and talk to myself
About all the things I wish I could say
All the things I think

Today I am happy to be with friends
And then happy to be alone

The feeling still hasn't completely come back
And there may be a part of me that is just concerned
That I'm this happy

But I am not fooled by a cruel reality

I will be nicer than I should
I let down my walls to make other people feel better
About their own insufficiency
That's what I do
I am an honest liar

But I know that my world is moving
I know that the people I thought would always be around
Are going
But I am here
In my same chair
Where I watch people move on
And hope that they remember me
Hope that something about me permanently marked their lives

Because one day we will be on other sides of the world
With lost letters and failed attempts to remember one another
And then our memories will be the only places we can see each other
But it fades
Life happens and we forget what made us this way
We forget the people who witnessed our lives
And made me believe in love again
Made me want to stop hating what can not happen
And dance in the love that God has given me
The only thing I ever needed
And never really wanted

But sometimes it concerns me
Knowing that you won't remember me

And I should step out of the scene completely
But friends have a way of sticking with me
Even when no one else remembers

Blessed Assurance

I have peace
The peace that I prayed for months ago
And it found me when I needed it
Two nights ago
In a dream
A dream of dancing in a fountain
With the moon shining so bright
That it could have swallowed me whole
And I wanted nothing more

I will testify
That the joy of the Lord is my strength

And the strength has made everything look differently
Everything looks like the moon and God is my fountain
Pouring mercy over me

The strength to let go
Of an 18 year old girl
Who wanting nothing more in the world but love
A yearning in her heart
Since she was 16 and that door was opened so prematurely

But love awaits me

And I prayed that things would be different
But I prayed for strength if everything turned out the way
I knew it would
And above all else I prayed for God's will

The difference of two short years in me
I want the will of God
More than love from this earth
I want Jesus more than my next breath
More than the people I love
More than the memories that play over and over in me
I want Him more

"The Lord is near to the brokenhearted"
I found the verse when I was 14 and it stayed with me
It clung to the broken heart of a 14 year old girl
And it has kept me all these years
The Lord is near to me
And even if my heart has been passed out in a crowd of many
My heart has found completion in the Lord
The broken pieces are restored
And every time they look more like Jesus
I have not a complain in the world

This is what I want my life to be
More of Jesus
And less of me