me on the internet tbh af

Y'know sometimes I forget the layout of my room

All my past bedrooms  

Blending together 

In the darkness of the night.

I wake up shocked

My closet isn't next to my bed anymore.

So convinced that if I woke up and saw it there

I could walk out to my grandma's room

Or be late to my middle school bus again.

And it's just that small thing that's left

That still brings up that ache 

Of revision and past memories,

Closest across the room now

Door on the left. 

Same bed, same clothes

Different building

Makes all the difference.

Oh how resemblance works

I just realized this today 

As I was told by a relative 

How I look exactly like my grandma 

When everyone else had been saying my mom 

Although some also said my aunt.

Does resemblance say more about you 

Or how the viewer saw the other person 

Seeing in you what they loved in them.

And its interesting how everyone can compare you

To someone different.

Your joy reminding them of another

Someone else they miss, 

Who you can resemble

Do you think if I saw my childhood best friends

Walking the other way on the street

Would they recognize me?

Back in the city I grew up in 

A visitor in someone else's home,

I'm trying to pick up an old thread.

Trying to find a throughline 

To find a direction for this life

An explanation for the changes,

So I could tell them where I've been.

Why do I still keep their contacts

Clutched like a hoarder 

With so many gems of memories

Half of which he forgets to remember.

What good is it to me to keep them around

Except to call out if I ever see them

On the other side of that street

It never fails to amaze me

How I didn't think I was smart

"She needs to speak more loudly" 

"She tends to be more of a listener than a participant" 

Chased with the advice of projecting my voice to the back wall

Or the calls to "speak up"

I thought I was stupid.

Maybe something about feminism

Maybe something about race and culture

Maybe something about intersectionality.

It's hard to know who I am

When there always is everything else.

And who am I without all these things

The grief of decision making

Mourning the loss of what could have been

Who could have been.

The loss of someone you never really knew 

Never could have

Never will

Now.

My grandma gave me this sweater

And honestly, I hate it.

Something about the bright pink color,

The weird shape of the sleeves,

So tight and constricting.

The wool fabric that somehow feels so sharp

As though needles got sewn in.

The open front that wasn’t really a sweater

Not really a cardigan, not really a vest.

The sweater could be looser,

Maybe a different material,

Maybe a different color.

I usually have sort of a taste for sweaters,

But there was something about this one

That I really didn’t understand.

I tried so many times to style it

With different jeans and shirts to wear under,

But something about it wasn’t meant to be.

This was, of course, a couple years back.

Now the sweater sits in the bottom corner of my closet

And I look at it again with the fresh eyes of

Young adulthood.

I can’t bring myself to throw the sweater away,

So there must be something about it I like.

Maybe it’s the implication of the hard work,

The many hours of effort that went in.

The former potential of knitting talent

Lost to the consequences of age.

The gift of an item of utility,

Squandered to growth and rejection.

The love of a handmade item

Wasted on arms that didn’t appreciate it.

Ungrateful, Unappreciative, Unthankful.

And maybe every time I move to throw it out

My hands are pushed back down to my sides,

Heavy with the weight of the guilt.

The weight of inaction and neglect.

So maybe it wasn’t the sweater who needed to change,

Maybe it was myself

Who should have grown to fit it.

Maybe it was me,

Who could still learn to like it.

For its boldness was a statement

Not something to hide and force to conform.

And maybe now I could wear it,

I am all alone in this glen that surrounds me,

Lush green trees and spry yellow flowers

Stretching on for yards and yards.

Yards of this yard that’s temporarily ours,

___ But there is someone behind me.

I close my eyes and listen to the wind,

The whooshing, the wondrous feeling,

The birds’ chirp brings out some ancient desire

To be part of nature for more than just a while,

___ But there is something behind me.

I stay turned, looking out at the field.

So many colors contrast against the pale of the sky,

Like bright splashes of paint on an empty canvas.

So many things, so many endless existences,

Endless chances and choices abound.

___ There is something behind me,

___ And it is getting closer.

I feel a sense of guilt for not looking

Time cannot stay frozen forever,

Eventually I have to turn around and

So I look, and it is there.

A choice to be made.

Expectations to be fulfilled.

Things to be done, must be done.

I wish you could see me the way I see you 

Cause you make me believe hope is still alive 

Even though I know you don't believe 

In silly little things like that.

I hate how to get over you

I've had to listen to your favorite music,

And in trying to escape you

I feel closer to you than ever. 

I hate how I'll never be pictured 

Nobody aligning a lens for me 

To try to capture the love in their eyes

Through a photograph

Beautifully, like I'd do for you,

But maybe I'm narcissistic. 

I hate how I've told you all my stories

So telling them every time to others 

Reminds me of your reactions

Always at the right parts

The way I always hoped someone would. 

Maybe I'm too stuck on myself 

Hoping you're thinking of me too.

Maybe it's narcissistic

To like how our pasts align

In ways that are funny enough, to me. 

So I'm sorry for thinking of you 

And thinking of myself too 

Alongside you.

Sorry for trying to dream of the impractical.

I know the logistics

We don't align 

Or even match up. 

So sorry I do this often

And you know it too

You know, you make me hate me

And it's not even because of what you said

(although a little is)

Or what I know you feel about me

(but some of it might be)

Really it's because of myself

(and the you I had imagined).

Because I let myself fall into the trap

And now you're always here.

I crafted a space for you

A little nook in my brain.

I've thought of everything you like

All the things I said that make you laugh

Everything that made you crack a smile.

I made room for the place you would be

Anticipating that you would care

To try and step in it.

So I suppose it's not your fault you didn't

Mainly my fault I ever really cared. 

It's still there

That space in my mind

What happens when I no longer see you each summer

Where do I go when I feel the oft returning urge to talk

But you've forgotten about me.

All our circles

All our groups

Reshaped and redesigned 

To cut out me.

What happens when you have new jokes that I don't get

Where do I go when something big happens

If not to you. 

I don't know where I'm supposed to turn to

How I'm supposed to jump to the future

If I have no one to fall back to 

When I miss the mark.

Because I don't know where I'm going 

And neither do you 

But at least we had each other in that.

And now you've found others

And I still can't talk to anyone but you.

I didn't do anything wrong

And neither did you

But I hoped when we all moved on

There's a rotting piece of broccoli at the back of my parents fridge 

And I honestly don't know why it's there. 

Could it be that my dad

Infallible, knowledgeable about everything, 

Had he intentionally left it there? 

But broccoli used to be his favorite food,

Eating it every day for lunch

First step on his mission to live forever.

But how could it be that he's forgotten that goal? 

Renounced his renouncement of unhealthy joys in life,

To just enjoy whatever time he has left. 

But how could that be? 

How could he admit defeat? 

How could he forget about the broccoli?

How could he forget that he's supposed to be invincible? 

Every time he asks me to repeat myself 

What if I spend my entire life

Comparing everyone to you,

Always thinking of someone not even there

Which doesn't even feel fair

To all who are here and actually care.

What if I waste my life

Missing the hope that I had 

When I thought we could be,

Nostalgic for a fake feeling

A belief that would soon flake,

Fleeting.

What if I go my life 

Thinking I miss you

And yet what is there to miss

We didn't even share so much as a kiss

But in my mind 

There is some shared bliss

While in the world outside of mine

That thought is just amiss. 

What if I continue on my days

Saying I hate you

When really there was never any you 

It was just me,

Which I suppose only leads

To one conclusion.

But I won't let you.

Because

What if I don't spend my life

Following the ghost of you

Created by my mind

Leading me nowhere 

Because I don't truly know

Where you would go

Paradoxically long distance 

You're my favorite person

And yet I tear up at the thought of you 

You make me cry

And yet I love you so.

What happens when I've seen you for the last time? 

How do I prepare for there being no,

See you next time

No guarantees ever again

No chance to look back on a shared nostalgia 

How can I look forward to seeing you again? 

When it's just become 

The end.

I still keep up our picture you gave me on the wall

Just in case you decide to visit.

Really I know you wont

So call it wishful thinking

In the small chance you do.

But dare I say I'm glad you dont?

Sometimes I wish I could take your laugh

And bottle it up

To take it with me

So I can always remember 

That there are good people.

Although I think it would be contradictory  

Because I'd just get lost

Drunk on your voice

And forget to pick up the phone

When you called.

It's taken months to get used to it

You being so far away

And just days to slip back

Into our old patterns.

No one I miss more than you 

And yet nobody I'm as scared to talk to

Worrying this will be the time

That I ruin it,

That we'll no longer work,

That I won't hear your laugh again.

So it's a bit of a thrill everytime I hear it

Uncontrolled, free 

Like it's bubbling out of you

Like I give you a genuine reaction that makes you

Happy

Because that's what you make me 

Isn't it a little sick. The way you move somewhere new You have to adapt to all the newness Get used to the new places Sayings People A new way of talking covers up the old. But isn't that what you should do?

Get accustomed Fit in to the local customs And be normal

But oh isn't it sick? How our minds are a limited flash drive Only a quantifiable number of slots Only so many people can be had Friends can be remembered Until we forget. Leave them behind. A figment of the past. Not really real anymore. To us.

Except in the brief passings on social media A former friend turned celebrity Gracing our feed with their lives Waiting for them to notice us Existing only in our screens Only in our memories Only in what once was.

And isn't it sick How we can't always just remember How we can't stand our whole lives Facing backwards Looking back. How in order to move forward We have to leave it behind.

And is there anything wrong? Anything wrong in moving forward? Working on the life you have to live now? Instead of focusing on what was? Nothing? Nothing wrong?

Then why Does It Feel So Bad

To move on To replace the slots in my heart With new names New places.

To change. Even when I said I wouldn't.

To forget. Even when I said I wouldn't.

To drift Apart. Even when we both promised We wouldn't.