SARAH MITCHELL
STRESS CARDIOMYOPATHY
Today
I wish I was Julius Caesar
So I could have a salad to myself
Or a famous kingdom
And a famous lover
But also because it would be less painful for me
To get stabbed to death
By my friends
Than to endure the stress cardiomyopathy
That my real life lover gave to me
OXYGEN
A girl
In a museum
Of dead brown bushes
And wide open winds
Is dying
Because there are no green trees
In sight
Therefore,
She cannot breathe
WATERMELON DEHYDRATION
Sometimes
When you eat too much watermelon in the summer
You have to pee a bunch in the middle of the night
But today I didn’t eat too much watermelon
I just tasted a little too much of his sweetness until I reached a bitter rind at the end
And it’s keeping me up at night
With tears coming out of my eyes
Waking me up
And dehydrating me
MOSQUITO BITES
Our conversation
Was a mosquito bite
On my ankle
That swelled in the middle of the night
And I stayed up scratching my anxieties
Until they left scars
Burned into my skin
ENOUGH FOR YOU?
In broad daylight
I’m questioning
Everything you have said
Because so many others
Have left me
Naked in the sun
While they hide in the shadows
I am sitting here thinking
Am I good enough for you
Will you accept me
Even if my secrets have to be extracted like an archeological dig
Will I be able to give you
The happiness you deserve
HOW MANY?
How many raindrops
Fell from your eyes
During my monsoon season?
ABANDONED
I am abandoned
And swept clean
No crumbs left to feed even ants crawling inside for warmth
YOU'LL NEED AN X-RAY FOR MY EMOTIONS
I don’t have anything to say
And I have so much to say
But the words are written on the inside curves of my rib cage
And it would take xrays
To explain
REPELLING WITHOUT ROPES
Grasping
Reaching
Watching my wisp of breath travel in bubbles under cold settled water
A heart escapes reality
And repels down
With no ropes to catch it
When all moments
Of human connection cease for the day
And a head full of thoughts
Travels centuries of train tracks alone
BLISTERED FROM THE DESERT
I had never been to the desert
But it burned away a part of me
Because when I left
My heart was blistered
life was not where it should be
And I knew the way I looked at you
Was not the way that you looked at me
THEY ARE IN THE COLLECTION
He is in the collection
Hidden
In the erasure marks
Of the pencil
His outline hanging on the curve of the g
And intently
He scours for hints
Of anger
Of hatred
But all there is
Is a faint outline
A sketch on page 2
And 22
And 39
Of the girl he once knew
Who has transformed
Herself
Into imagery
And prose
And poetry
EXPECTATIONS
You don’t know
How damaging
It is
Being the rung on the ladder
Where your weight rests
So you can reach little plastic stars
On the ceiling
Of your gallery
Of expectations
STEALING FLASHLIGHTS
I can’t take
feeling like my chest is a cave
Where stalagmites suspending from the ceiling
Are being knocked down
From your hands
Reaching into my chest
For my light source
And pulling it away from me
HONESTY
It was a simple plea
For honesty
And his own selfishness
Caused
Pain
Beyond comprehension
HIS COLLECTION
He extracted her heart
A long time ago
And kept it in a jar
On his shelf
It collects dust most times
But today he pulled it down for 5 minutes just to admire the selfless beauty
And then put it back next to the others
Never any intentions of returning it
To the hole in the chest
Of the girl he introduced himself to 3 years ago
ROCK BOTTOM
after I go from walking in meadows of stars with him
Time separates us with flying saucer machetes
and I end up
melting
and hidden in the core of the earth
far below rock bottom in the ocean
and trapped in the heat
of missing him.
SNAIL SHELL
She lays there for hours
Letting dead skin
On the edges of her eyelashes
Beat her cheeks
Until tears heave
Through her throat in early afternoon
Her daily release
Of days squeezed by
Quiet cobras suffocating her exhalations
Quivers of knee caps
Threaten to pop out
And I’ll wrap myself around her shaking body
And think about how she is shaking like a leaf in spring wind
So I’ll hold on just enough
To this fallen leaf so she doesn’t blow away or get crushed
By a pair of eager sneakers on a windy day
HEARTBURN
"you ever get heartburn?"
he asked.
"only for people"
I said.
Internally
it's like I just opened my chest
and replaced
it with an ice sculpture.
It's crazy to think
that this fuzzy feeling,
so frigid cold it burns numb,
can still be here
among such personal prosperity
and after infinities
that lapse among
petite laughter collections
RARE
I am
A rare species
People consider extinct
But you found a way to lure me in a trap
To study me
To admire me
To show me off
After months
You seem bored
And instead of letting me free
You’ve shoved a syringe in my veins
Of poisons and toxins
To kill me slowly
And feed me to taxonomy
While you hunt for something more exotic
A Rare phenomena
To make you famous
If you let my heart stop beating
There will be no recovery
If you change your mind.
THE BRAID
you held my hair in your hands
like you'd never see it again.
Your fingers tugged it slowly into sections
until you made a braid
and when you left
I let it stay
until it fell apart
while I was sleeping
and I cried
and then I
fell
apart
into so many different
scattered strands
PIECES
Sometimes
it takes days
of pure silence
to overcome
the mountains of negatives
that I feel
jumbled in my bones
so if I lose my voice
please hold me
hug me
love me
so tight
that the pieces that have fallen
will squish back together.
EMPTY AIR
I'm just laying here in my bed
and my empty hand is dangling
over the edge
like a flower draped on a fence
bleeding impressions
of melancholy ink
into wood
I just keep thinking
that my gravity influenced hand
is useless
without yours to garnish the top
I'm under my covers
but you know there is always that spot on my back
where goosebumps always crowd
because your body
isn't pressed against my skin
and your lips
aren't leaf paintbrushes
on the nape of my neck
I just need someone
to lift the Indian mound
that is my body
and carry it in soft arms
safe from the pressures
and the past
censures of time
the quivers of my small finger muscles
are longing
to hold something
other that the tickles of my own carbon dioxide
BEE STING
Crazy how a bee sting
Swells
Just like my heart does
At the mention of your name
Or a glimpse of you passing by
GOOSEBUMPS
slept in today
I wasn't tired
but,
I wanted to forget
that in the middle of the night
you slipped away
like a silk sheet
into the wind
and I found myself
chilled with goosebumps
and covered in lonely air
MORSE CODE
Three times in twenty-four hours
You walk in front of my face
my lips get hollow
my palms perspire
and my eyes fill
with AwKarRDneSs
We are mute birds
singing
internal sorrows
floating grey feathers
form a line
of disappointments
and judgments
and emotional heat waves
that exchange contention
with Morse Code blinks
You follow close behind
in alley ways of my past.
I'll let you eavesdrop over my shoulder one more time
to crystal clear vibrations from my vocal chords
in a conversation completely unrelated to you
this one, filled with shakes in the airwaves
because of what was never spoken
when the two of us could harmonize with each other
and because I know
that for once you are listening
purely to my feelings
and not your own
NERVOUS WATER
you are lurking in the shadows
and it appears to me
that in between the lines of prose
you are reading
to catch a glimpse
of the highs and the lows
of where my heart is in this world.
Your reputation
under my ballpoint pen
is marred
from the
Humid thoughts
that have become
a museum of diseases
of past psychological monsoon seasons
which you contributed heavily to
my consciousness prescribed
poetry therapy
to cover
any sort of emotion
that reminds me of any damaging, lingering, happiness
between us that used to exist
in a paper shaped heart
if you should need to know,
my words
are the pillow
that holds
screams of all the past pains
I used to feel
but I don't need a container
of intravenous therapy
of your reluctant feelings
tapped into my veins
like I used to
I kiss different now
since that night
In blinking, blue, Mystery Appliance light next to the empty glass of nervous water
on a stool
is a grave
where I drowned my old habits of stubborn dependence.
I was not confident, diffident, and shy when I should have been bold, precise, and articulate with you.
My inarticulate nature brought me to challenge emotions the size of a scaly dragon that could scorch the life out of you if you walked near
and I walked through that blazing shower curtain of fire and falling sparks like I wasn't made of crippled ice shavings
I became a bubbling burn
that blistered in the flames.
I became ash that floated away with the wind
and I rebuilt myself from dirt pieces
emerging a new person
and I have you to thank.
If you suddenly come around the corner out of the shadows to find me,
you won't.
I am completely unrecognizable to the girl you once held because I am camouflaged in my own replacement
of the pages you have torn from my memoirs.
DEPRESSION POEMS
Construction Paper:
I press skip
when I hear a chord
or a phrase
that sets my soul ablaze
but for some reason
I can't seem to press skip
on the record
the one that plays when I'm alone.
the one that says "I'm weak."
or not enough
and I feel like purple glue
on kindergarten construction paper
just clinging onto the vibrant color
but instead falling into
the cold
tiled
floor
FROM THE FRIEND OF REMEMBER
If you're finally reading this,
Just know I miss you
and I hope Remember
whispered
love to you
In the time it took
your familiar messenger
Abscence
to declare fond insecurities
to me.
OXYGEN
I run myself ragged
just so I don't have to miss
your dusty looks
in windows outside
time has to be filled
and I can hardly breathe, eat, or sleep
until a pause in my day
interrupts my pulse
and I miss you
like I miss air
when I'm under barrels of water
in the ocean
TEARS WITH THEM
There are people far away
that cry themselves to sleep
and my Adam's Apple hesitates when I swallow
because I weep with them.
a pair of eyes
piercing
tearing
thrashing me apart
because I talk about skin being shared
and thrown
and curled into flames
in ways most would never think of
in a far away bed
a young woman cries
because someone left her sheets cold
and her senses manipulated
to the point that tears never came
until today
NAKED GUMS
I wish I could open my mouth
and tell you everything
but I'm seriously afraid
that if I do
all these negative thoughts
will fall out
like teeth in dreams
and I'll just be left
with naked gums
the smile I lack now
is nothing compared to what I envision
if you listened
THE INSIDE
My thoughts are as vital as heartbeats
they flow through my body like blood
If they stop or if they flood
either way, I'll choke
I'm tired of taking the metal part of a ruler
and pressing it against my skin
Will it cut or will the lines just tick, tick, tick?
until my body is hot, warm, cold, cooler
I'm trying to measure up
to the list inside
I take an eraser
and I try to hide
but no one can hide
from the inside
SLIDE
Take a day,
one from weeks ago
and wish you were there.
Take that moment
like a seashell in your hand
look at its beauty
and then watch it
slide.
you'll wish for it back
it's the day you became lonely
it's the day people noticed you were different
but didn't know what to say
all you wish is that they too have changed
they dropped you in the sand
instead of holding it in your hand
tight
like the green in their hand
KAUAI CRIES
Dry waterfalls
down below
are like dried tears
on a cheek
eliminated by a sun
mist above
covers true lines
and trees are eyelashes spread
climbed by vines
don't hide those lines
when ideas rewind
rhythms are assigned
to weeping willows
swaying on top of grassy pillows
The jagged tear stained landscape
becomes an explorer's escape
TWO WORLDS
Two worlds have always been fine
I can see a distinct and distant line
from fog and shadows
that whisper you are mine
Oceans churn and sunsets soften
and I think of the other often
In my bones
I feel a bit rotten
There is an ache from the shadows up ahead
Across the seas that are larger than thoughts in my head
and I don't know where the ache attends
but sometimes I wish I was away from this paradise instead
There are people I love in the sand
and people I have loved in the mainland
I am on an incredible journey
But in my heart I'm longing for it to end
And I don't know why I wish this time away
I've never been so rushed anyway
but I hope for one moment I can breathe
and in the present find the peace to stay
THE GHOST
He is haunted by a ghost
who wants to hold his hand
It weeps and whines and it never understands
The words it writes
on fleshy walls in his sleep
cuts into past wounds significantly deep
For months he thought it normal
that the ghost vacations away
but there is a guest room in the attic
where it forgets to stay
It always meanders back
and when it slithers back
it's like anger is the season.
We skip beyond April showers
and burn living flowers
The spirit hands the lighter
and his twisted memory is the gasoline
SUN FLAMES
I will write
until the ink no longer
breathes that name
until thick shadows
become
blazing sun rays
and all reminders
are extinguished
by their flame
LATE NIGHT THOUGHTS
Do not slip into my thoughts again
I cannot take the pain
do not call me yours in any way
just please, walk away
It's been years of me inside my head
but the hurt is finally leaving
in a little journal beside my bed
The words are quickly leaving
from a heart that was once bleeding
but now is giving to all who are reading