When I was young you taught me to be strong.
You told me nothing was there in the darkness that wasn’t there in the daylight, and I believed you.
But I see dark eyes at the end of my bed now, reminding me that you’re not here anymore, and I realize I was only strong because you were.
Every time your doors were open, I was there.
I tried to make myself into the person you wanted me to be.
I raised my hands and went along with the plans, but I was never home in your arms.
Tired of pretending I’m more than a teenage music nerd with an unhealthy coffee addiction and far too much time on my hands.
I’m not some deep, philosophical person, I don’t speak (or think) in poetry and I’m a lot more black and white than I often pretend to be.
I’m nothing but a small child growing up in the wild, a monkey being raised by the the One True King.
Four walls are easy to hide behind when you have the perfect disguise.
It can’t be a holy place when entrenched in lies.
My Savior died, while yours is standing at a pulpit, crying as he dumps water on the floor.
This isn’t a church.
This is a burial ground.
I miss you tonight, and I know I’m not the first to feel this way, and I doubt I’ll be the last.
Sometimes I wonder what you told her to make her fall in love with you.
You always had a way with words that made me want to write you down on every scrap of paper I had. Then when you took off the first time, I bled all of the compliments you paid me into my bathroom towels, and burned the poems you inspired, and I wanted to tell you not to come back but the hands of loneliness wrapped around my throat and wouldn’t release me until you came around again.
Best case scenario, I’m an afterthought, thrown into the mix last second for good measure.
Worst case scenario, I’m not a thought at all.
I saw your car today,
Red lights and silver paint,
Of course, it wasn’t you in the driver’s seat,
It was just a stranger and his wife.
I wondered what they were like.
Their hair was grey and their smiles were faint,
Just like yours was.
You’re long gone now, but the memories you left still resound.
I miss you every single day,
Especially in the summer.
I miss the smell of the front porch and the garden.
The walk to the mailbox with your hand in mine,
The laundry hanging out on the line.
It’s weird that it’s all still so easy to remember when it seems that you’ve been gone forever.
Sometimes I turn on the old songs we’d play in the car, and I get lost in the sound of your voice reaching over the music.
I miss the way we’d play the same songs over and over again,
Your fingerprints written on every disc.
I want to have that once again, but you’re still gone.
I miss the safety I found in your home.
It’s gone now, as are you.
The walls have been painted over, the garden torn out,
I want to scream, but it won’t bring you back now.
Now I’m staring at them,
They’re looking at me.
I know that they don’t see what I see.
I see your face as you drive away.
They see a girl who doesn’t know what to say.
Red lights and silver paint,
Tears are streaming down my face.
I don’t know why I feel betrayed, it wasn’t you who drove away.
You’re gone and I’m still here, wondering what you’d think of me if you were here today.
A Rambler In Bloom 