pacing lions' cages

"I believed that I wanted to be a poet, but deep down I just wanted to be a poem." —Jaime Gil de Bieda

[ttwentysix]

fuck it: haiku game

send me a word or phrase or ~vibe~ and i'll write a lil somethin'

[ttwentysix]

i just updated my theme and it looks so pretty please go look

also hello does this mean i will start writing again ???? only time will tell

[ttwentysix]

I’ve never learned how to spell "tomorrow" right the first time.  Does it go I before E or you after me when we’re walking home at 4 a.m., drunk and blissful and full of silly, stupid hope. Summer nights like glow worm, like cold grass with my head in your lap, like body full of lightning. Winter mornings like never leave bed, like wool socks, like I have a hard time smiling when it’s dark for 12 hours.  The freckles on your shoulders always left me tongue-tied. You're chewing on your lip like first date, age 14. You're chewing on mine like film scene lovers. We were tripping up stairs in a race to locked rooftop fire escapes, kissing in the hallways with nearly-burnt-out lightbulbs. I’ve never learned how to spell tomorrow because you were a tether to my minute-hand heart. There was no tomorrow, only the next moment I could curl into your booming laugh, around your warm arms, against your chest. Holding you felt like getting lost in the woods behind my house when I was young – I somehow always knew where to turn to make it home before dark. You are ocean mouth and backroad gravel voice and hands like brick-and-mortar around the burning church in my chest. Smile crooked like the street I grew up on, barefoot and scarred knees and crying silently in my locked bedroom.     I never learned how goodbye echoes. I never learned that love can be past tense. Then you were gone and only kissed me sober because you were too busy falling apart after your fourth whiskey and I was trying to hold your edges together but just kept cutting my fingers. Eyes less like oak trees and more like black ice. Voice like storm cell, like prison break. You screamed less like summer thunder and more like a fox in a trap. A yowl like finish lines, like splinter heart, like don’t touch me anymore.  Doors echo when they’re slammed. I learned how to spell tomorrow.

“what goes up” by h.f.j. (via ttwentysix)

[ttwentysix]

hey, i was just scrolling through my old tumblr and stumbled upon one of your quotes "for unhappy girls who like sitting in the sun", just wanted to let you know that since 2014 to this day, that little list is one of my favorite things in the world, i never forgot a single line and i carry it all in my heart, thank you for that. kept me going on for years, on my worst days. thank you, really. ❤️

I didn’t realize you sent this to both my blogs and I still want to cry thinking about it. Thank you, friend. So so much.

[ttwentysix]

I know the smell of honeysuckles like I know my name. They drag me toward their twisting arms, beckoning with the promise of a drop of nectar on the middle of my tongue. Sweet like the dog days of summer when I was 10 and didn’t know the weight of things.

[ttwentysix]

forgiveness

A slate wiped brand new.Let me burn this second chance To the ground once more.

[ttwentysix]

On falling apart from old friends

It only hurts ifYou ignore all the bad times.It only hurts then. 

[ttwentysix]

Mountains

What are men, she said,Compared to the hurt I’ve fought,The mountains I’ve climbed.

(send me a prompt and i’ll write a haiku)

[ttwentysix]

you're an amazing writer :)

thank you!!!! i haven’t written in ages but ty ty ty ty ty 

[ttwentysix]

On choosing to live simply.

White sheets, white blankets,Fewer things to remind me That nests always break.

(send me a prompt and i’ll write a haiku)

[ttwentysix]

Send me a prompt and I’ll write a haiku!!!!!!!

[ttwentysix]

Loving you feels like reverse origami.

six word love story by h.f.j. (via @ttwentysix)

[ttwentysix]

Left

You slept on the left side of your bed the night I was too tired to move. Both of us in altered states of exhaustion – you, radiating heat; me, hyperaware. Then you were tangled around me, a growl of a man. You touched me first like innocence, then again like hunger. 

The left side of the bed was empty when I woke up. The only reason I know I wasn’t dreaming is the way you danced with me three night later. 

[ttwentysix]

I'm so happy to have found your blog, it inspires me incredibly... like being extremely sexually frustrated, but over words pulled together, and not bodies. If that makes sense.

That’s how I feel when I write, so that feeling makes sense. Thank you for this message, raindrop. 

[ttwentysix]

It was art only recognizable firsthand that I am trying to drag back into my home. Records with songs we sang in the car, in your room, on the street.  Candles that smell like rain and smoke, like your shirt, like too much Chinese food. A shadow-box of every 3 a.m. I’ve ever seen: wet grass, ticket stubs, streetlight, bug bites shoved into a frame.

The Hindsight Looking Glass by h.f.j. (via LikeAslan on Wordpress)

[ttwentysix]

I miss your messy smile kissing mine.

Seven word love letters by h.f.j. (via ttwentysix)

[ttwentysix]

OKAY this is a run-on but hear me out: writing poems is the hardest and most rewarding thing i will do with my time and i honestly still can’t believe that so many of y’all follow lil’ old me and read my words it makes me so :’’’’)