poems by jess

Written in the backs of ubers and typed loudly while my family sleeps

[notpoetryatall]

We turn down the music Because I am terrified Because this is not my house Because I have ventured into territory I'm not sure I wanted to venture into We turn down the music And heart pounding I force myself to act calm Responsible Hello yes this is my house that noise isn't coming from here And I open the door Prepare to be calm And it's you And your silhouette In the unexpected darkness of the lobby Lit from below by the light of your phone Profile turned I think you were lounging in the door frame And it was a simultaneous kind of relief Not in trouble And it's you And later And now Still in my mind Is that first image of you As I opened the door Turned sideways like a portrait Like you'd been placed there for art Still It burns in my retinas That first shock of you

for the boy in the door // the boy at the party // the boy who buys my breakfast // the boy who at first sight always makes me feel something

[notpoetryatall]

Typewriter rewrites

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Here's one I typed up after a big night

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More typewriter rewrites

[notpoetryatall]

You get rid of them But not really They linger They linger in voices In your own voice In your hesitations and deferences They cling in every laughed off So though they're gone They're not They have become you You have become them

Insecurity

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My soul sister We are bonded When you feel I feel and I bleed when your heart aches past breaking Your beauty is beyond my doubt my faith my loyalty When you weep I weep and when I weep you hold me close and press to my forehead in a mark of your own making My tears are laughs When we hold each other tight We laugh And weep Intermingle Uncertain But comforted

For my sister

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Speak Again and again and again And again Never cease Never let shame or worry clamp closed your lips Let them flow with passion and faith Preach to me A private sermon for my ears And never doubt that it reaches me Moves me Fills me with what you pour Preach and rave and bless me with your delight I will hear every word and hold it close to me till I hear you speak again

Preacher boy

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My typewriter arrived so I am typing poetry now

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The distance is It heaves and wretches between us A couch cushion divides We are adjacent islands She is my mirror We laugh and shake and falsify it But we parallel She speaks stories that I have lived She slowly breaks open like the tentative petals of a beating heart Unfurls extends and reveals And in the secrets she shows she shows me myself But not myself And as her heart breaks in the retelling the reliving the rebreaking My heart breaks And when she wipes her tears away I let mine fall as I hold her hand in the soft presence of my hands And I wish there was language Wish there was behaviour Some way to show that we are the same For the beam of light in her to talk to the solitary knowing in me But she talks of wavelengths And I talk of existence And these things are so similar but so distant Almost but not quite And though we are paired, duplicated, resonate in ways that are so so close They will never fully meet And I nod and hold and reassure with the weighty insufficiency of words And hope that she feels my existence trying to be her light That our frames may intersect somewhere And wish that my understanding showed in ways that might be understood

I wrote a poem for my friend who deserves the world and more and who makes me wish words were enough

[notpoetryatall]

The tin man aches for a heart To feel Is wanting Not feeling Does the pumping flesh An organ Make us feel at all Why do we call it Heartache Why does our chest Moan and creak How can a heart break It pumps the same in sorrow As in joy There are no splinters or fractures But we call it Heart Ache Break Our heart is uninvolved Why a heart Can tin feel Without a heart the tin man yearned for a heart Is that not enough? Is wanting to feel Not feeling

Tin Man's Lament

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You are sweet like saccharine And everyone knows That with one taste your honey coating will linger and linger with a desperate clinging And knowing it Doesn't make it easier Knowing it doesn't make it any less easy to fall in deep sticky love with you Because knowing that you are sugar through and through Knowing you are without a bitter spot Without a dark sour centre That you are crystal candy so transparent and easy Makes it so much harder to forget your taste Your smell That you are a malice free sweet A pleasure food without ulterior And one would think that knowing your sweetness only runs so deep Might taint Tarnish But I long for your taste on my tongue For the burning sharpness of sugar on my teeth every time I think of you I want candy coated thoughts I want sugar syrup touches And I pray that my jarring cautious bitter is not a strain on your palette

For the sweet boy

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in the early hours of the morning I roam the house like the resident ghost uninvited unnoticed I walk on my toes or maybe float, feet glancing the carpet, soft steps made silent as the house sleeps breathes I lay awake and count my breaths the rush of air through my chest and out my nose like my mother taught me but it isn’t soothing these days I wander back and forth between rooms to the couch and the cat and the tight coil of a sleeping form undisturbed by my intrusion maybe I am the spectre of this place the remnants the impression of a person that never quite made it to solidity

the ghost of number 81

[notpoetryatall]

It starts with a lie Or an admission of a lie And from there we start And I start to know you And I start to let you know me And I try my usual tricks My usual lines But you don't fall for them You see through them Like no one else sees through them You read me Through the sealed pages Make me an open book And I am so afraid of you Because you are the one person I cannot fool

For the boy who reads me

[notpoetryatall]

I track my mood by the shades on my nails By the bottles that lie empty in my bedside drawer I see the blacks from years ago When I was dark and lonely I see the colours from yesteryear When I decided to be vibrant and exciting I see the pastels of late When I became gentle and content So now I find myself painting my nails dark again Put away the pastels And see my mood reflected when I look down at my fingers

nail polish

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Something heavy hangs on my shoulders I wander the house like a vampire Or a ghost Maybe I open the fridge Ravenous And eat leftovers that are cold in the middle I drink hot tea left to cool I sleep till noon and wake up Exhausted I skip I miss I make excuses why I can't be there I trade my pastels for black I communicate with text My voice turns brittle in the back of my throat I forget if this is the act, if this is pretend Or if I've been playing pretend so long that the truth is forcing its way out Forcing its way through me Keeping me indoors Keeping me away Draining me eating at me leaving me Empty Aimless Transparent

it’s been a while since i felt like this

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The scent of leather is arresting Because it's your announcement A herald of your arrival It reaches out Lets me know He is coming He is here It lets me prepare Prepare myself for you Because I want to bask in that scent Forever For you to wrap your arms around me so all I breathe all I know is you and your scent But I realize that you don't own it Don't own that scent So when a woman with a leather bag sits beside me on the bus I look up Expecting you to be beside me And am left disappointed And slowly Every time my senses fool me into thinking you're here Every time you're not here It detaches from you And becomes leather again

Leather again

[notpoetryatall]

They sing in harmony And I look over to you And you are illuminated And I smell your leather And I know that it's alright It's alright that you don't love me It's alright that we don't feel the same It's alright Everything is alright And maybe I still love you And it's alright Because though you don't love me the way I'd like you to You love me In your own way And it's alright It's alright

It's alright now