mrly

[mrly]

[mrly]

Everything I’ve ever let go of has claw marks on it Hand burnt text on silk velvet 42″ x 24″ 2016

[mrly]

And I’ve told you I am a woman of reason, but my intuition may get the better of me on days like today - when the sun is hiding beneath a cloud and the trees are drowning. I am not asking you to withstand the storm, but only remember there is shade and that sunlight comes out, too, on these days, just briefly and exact at certain points.

Will you stand underneath the leaves with me?

Indirectly and concisely, you come. Carefully, you plant yourself beside me. I tell you on days like this, I may become a bug, and crawl into myself.

Will you find me?

Certain and quietly, you nod. And I rest myself on you, for you understand the day like today.

And we sit - together.

#writing #original writing #creative writing #poetry #excerpt from a book i'll never finish #poem #original poem #prose #short excerpt

[mrly]

I felt bewildered at the convenience store. And I know you didn’t want to say it, but I could feel you weren’t comfortable either. We nodded and stood and waited. We pushed and raced. We acted as we should and fell into place, into a line, or within a crowd. I felt we were lying to ourselves - pretending and melding into something we aren’t familiar with.

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[mrly]

I said I love you

Do not let time turn us into strangers

Into a passerby of each other’s life

Keep the doors open and the windows unlocked

I love you

And god must be the line that connects us to one another

Those circumstances we find ourselves in

God must be those indescribable moments - those times where everything adds up

I love you

And god is not a person, not a man, not a noun

God must be something to be felt

It must be our breath before we catch it, our hands before they fall, the sun before it shines

I love you

And time is fleeting

The seconds are leaving and love is lasting

The flowers are wilting and we are still here

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[mrly]

Grief calls to you the way a mother yells for her child

Do not play after dark

Come home

Dinner is ready

The table is set

And you have not washed your hands

Grief pulls you by the ear

Into the house and sits you down

Say grace

Tells you to chew carefully and slowly

The streetlights are on and the sun is setting

Grief says let us barricade the front door

Keep what was inside and safe

Close the windows but open the blinds

Let pockets of outside in but distant

Grief bathes you

Washes your hair and rubs you dry

With an understanding that you will change after today

That you will need to be ready to change after tonight

Grief carries you into bed

Tucks you in

Puts your hair behind your ears

Kisses you goodnight, turns off the lights

To let you pretend

Morning will never come

#writing #original writing #creative writing #poetry #excerpt from a book i'll never finish #poem #original poem #prose #short excerpt

[mrly]

yes, but that is life and you must keep your shoes on and stay hungry and never forget there is a scorned taste willing to break itself for this will... that the moment in which you feel the most powerful and most vulnerable share the same pedestal, and you must remember to afford the two - with grace, in your life, and perhaps at your will. and that there is no greater feeling than watching the one you love overcome the pains you once fought. and that pain exists here, yes, but triumph does too. and seconds are collected in pockets of light and dark; of shade and sun; of black and white. that there is a trembling heart, chasing after each moment of time, hoping to grasp the life that passes us. you must remember, but forget, and remember to forget.

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[mrly]

i was looking too, but i didn't want you to notice

i was coy, i was cool, and i was pretending

meeting in glances, reminiscent feelings of hunger and thirst

two bodies in the same room but moments away

aching, yearning, longing

engaging in misleading conversations, unaware and inventing persons who act like this

animating ourselves to look like people and not feelings

performing for one another, against each other, and to others

at a loss, at an ends

the cue to start

and then you said hi

#writing #creative writing #excerpt from a book i'll never finish #poem #original poem #original writing #short excerpt #poetry #prose

[mrly]

you had an accent hard to understand and love that only found it’s way to the line between two things. i never blamed you for hugging me with torn hands. i knew what your arms were longing to say - stay here, forever, the house is yours and the world will always be there, spinning. stay here, with me and do not grow out of my embrace. stay here and i will learn to love you the right way, all over again

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[mrly]

filling the room with a sadness

you told me you felt it too

and when you walked in, you walked around it

and tried your best to stay intact

you kept telling a story and never found yourself finishing it

only jumping to the next story

the air left an urgency for your breath, almost like you needed to gasp for every word

i watched you ramble on and smiled inside myself

you left that day and i never saw you again

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[mrly]

and i confess to you at times i feel like a fraction of a person — never complete, never whole, always waiting

a certain brokenness inherited and distinct to myself

where certainties and absolutes are not accepted and where grayness is appreciated

existing in the space between but never near the lines

and always ripping between two spectrums and never winning - always lying on the ground

waiting to be answered and full

#writing #original writing #creative writing #poetry #excerpt from a book i'll never finish #poem #original poem #prose #short excerpt

[mrly]

you cried on sundays when no one could hear you while the sun set to forget the day

you rested your head on your hand and felt what it meant to be one

no one could find you but you made sure to keep yourself hidden

you let the world dissapoint you into a state of fear and never felt the need to get out

the clouds were leaving and you were sobbing

the days kept ending and letting you go

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[mrly]

"like the smell of soup on easter, and something about remembering how time will past and this will stay"

lights came in and scattered

the room was confused and lended itself to the sunlight

you carefully touched the ends of your hands, tracing the beginning of something you were afraid of

"always accidentally poetic" you spoke into the dense air

"always accidentally falling into a corners of a rhythm"

our eyes met and the sun left

#original poem #poem #original writing #creative writing #excerpt from a book i'll never finish #short excerpt

[mrly]

and there is something so special about the fleeting nature of girlhood

it is something so sacred to understand that the current moment will rest, nostalgic but pure in the body of a woman. that the current moment is already a memory - and what is girlhood but the collection of remembrance? the reflection of desires and wishes and moments of truth? but the fading openness and innocence in hurting and loving and feeling? it is the turn from girls to women in which we inherit self-control to stop, to halt the bleeding nature of girlhood. and it is during this growth, into femininity, where the majority of self lies reminiscent of an adolescence so timid, so limited in nature. it is in this growth where we learn to embrace who we couldn’t as girls - who we neglected as girls. it is in this space where the body learns to forgive the girl and embrace the woman. it is here where the woman always remembers the girl

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[mrly]

in the car the world stopped

and the reds of lights and hues of white fell gracefully and invited themselves onto the window and into the room. the world stood still, waiting to be admired as it was. but there was no room for admiration; the beginning and ends of seconds, and minutes, and hours, and days were spent carefully composing the moments to be undone, unclear, and unfair. a consistent state of uncertainty, where the world spun indifferently, carelessly, and recklessly. where you could fall and it would keep spinning you dizzy. until it spun you out of yourself and you waited for moments of clarity and purity and union. until that moment found it’s way to you — in reunion, in scripture, in the car. and in traffic, at the light, you were so ready for anything to the be answer.

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[mrly]

and for some reason it is so difficult to control this time and i can feel it slipping past my fingers beyond the outline of my body, trying to find a place to be and a place to hurt. and i can’t help it anymore; i can’t stop myself from spilling; i can’t contain what it is.

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[mrly]

one day i will be supported and loved and things will still hurt but it won't feel like i'm dying each time someone looks away. and i will still carry something in me but not enough to drag my feet. one day i will not feel like the heaviest thing in the room and i will walk into homes knowing i have one too -- no longer with a desperation to belong, but with confidence that there is somewhere for me too. and it will feel like i belong to someone or to something or to somewhere and i will come home to people who love me and to things that outlive me and i will feel full and whole and none of this can reach out to hurt me. and one day i will think about these days and i'll glance at them with nostalgia and cherish not the things or people or memories but cherish what parts of it i held onto.

#original writing #creative writing #prose