virtual journal

in love with sunsets and words // all 100% my poetry

[tulipdoodles]

Restless nights are better beside you I blame myself for your sleep deprivation but I can't bring myself to apologize Sending my condolences to your brain at 2am, part of me knows that it's awake because of me. Usually being lucid through the night has me miserable the next day but when I'm awake in your arms I have no complaints Laying in someone else's bed too big for us with one hand in your hair and another in your hand is preferable to any other position in the middle of the night and I wish we could lay like that forever Or at least until daybreak each morning. After one night I've memorized our synchronized movements- You will without fail always wrap your arms around me when I turn onto my side and I will press my nose into your neck each time you fall onto your back. I think it was a misnomer but you called me cute for the first time today Doubtable, since you also said you love me as you held me, sitting on your lap, both of us far from a heightened state of mind It's the thought that counts and your foggy-headed thoughts are much appreciated Especially when they're accompanied by your hands on my back and your lips on my shoulder. I can still taste your open mouth kisses and sometimes I think I can feel your soft breath on my skin Whenever I drift to sleep I feel your body pressed against mine before I tumble into dreams of this era lasting beyond its determined expiration date.

i.a.s. // restless

[tulipdoodles]

the longest days of the year are always the ones spent with you, but in summer every bright day is more than 24 hours. the heat drives me crazy but so does the sound of voices on the beach with the crash of waves filling my ears. i'm free as each bluebird perched on an olive branch and in the heat each tree is crisp and covered by leaves that fall in autumn.

i.a.s // summertime

[tulipdoodles]

Tonight there was no moon But it was the brightest night of the year. Street lights shone like stars and The little kids running down asphalt paths gleamed like lightning bugs. I love you the way bugs love light Drawn to you in the same hopeless way As if you were something physical More than an illumination bouncing off my own skin. But in the same way bugs are enamored by brightness The touch of the searing heat of the sun is what kills them in the end You'll be the death of me in the same way. Tonight there was no moon I ran down asphalt paths like a child again Blissful without you in my thoughts Thinking only of the ghosts I saw around me With sheets over their heads And eyes brighter than yours could ever be.

-i.a.s // happy halloween, you haunt me

[tulipdoodles]

it’s all looping back around history repeating itself again the same sunset over the same city after the same bad day. ready to be alone again? ready to be left behind? ready to feel like the only person who loves you has been pulled into this by you– by your same shaking breaking hands? ready to feel exhausted beyond belief drawn back into summer sorrow by promises of better days ahead? what could i do instead instead of the cracked ribs and fluid filled lungs instead of the broken bones and sprained ankles how can i break this same sad cycle the one i was trapped in two summers ago.

i.a.s // cycles

[tulipdoodles]

i am too hot under scorched skin– i press my icy palms into my thighs to soothe the burn. my sun-seared flesh gets goosebumps from the chill– like the desert floods after a brush of rain. my vision is hazy and my mind is sharp– piercing cricket chirps in a misty meadow. the fever dreams will appear foggy but resonate clear– a full moon half dimmed by the shadow of the sun.

i.a.s // fever dreams

[tulipdoodles]

Sepia tinted skies and soft linen summers We sat beneath the clouds and crows and let go with every passing hum from the riverbed. In our lemon scented city we did our best to hold our breaths Counting our steps from the garden to the guillotine. At the end of your street there was a bakery Where she decorated cakes and he washed dishes You played the piano and I swept the floors. I liked to believe that would be it for us That soft white walls would be all that could cage us And that the roof over our cotton heads would always be stronger than we were. That was the summer your mother called and told you lemons were too sour for you to keep calling them sweet So she took you to a place where you wouldn't be able to forget what bitterness tasted like  That was back when honey was in your heartbeat and you still walked with a skip in your step Down dirt roads paved with daisies and baby's breath When you still felt like a baby yourself. You told me we'd be babies until we couldn't be anything anymore and the more I laughed the less I believed we could ever grow out of the fuzziness of childhood. That very next summer the bakery was a liquor store and you didn't know how to play the piano. She stopped decorating cakes and started decorating the streets He broke more dishes than he washed. I'd spent my spring looking for what we lost in autumn Everything that got frozen over when winter began. But the riddles you wrote in the condensation of my windows are long forgotten; The trails you left for me became dead ends; The home you made for yourself in the ground caved in; The garden became so vividly overgrown that it died in full bloom.

i.a.s. // sensory overload: from the garden to the guillotine // april 6, 2016

[tulipdoodles]

You can compare everything about falling asleep to falling in love But meeting you was like waking up Sometimes it’s like falling in a dream, tumbling through clouds Jolting awake, eyes wide, lungs desperate for air like reaching the surface of the swimming pool. Falling in love with you was slow A steady heartbeat and drowsy eyelids Waking up starting from the fingers to the toes to the tip of my nose Soft sunlight in my eyes; morning. A head filled with feathers, lily white and dove gray thoughts behind my eyes It was love that brushed the hair out of my eyes and said “good morning, you’re home.” It was love that gained momentum Morning slumber into vivid afternoon. Sneakers on the sidewalk, racing to catch the bus– Love like realizing you’ve made it. People think love is like night, cozy blue and deep purple But love is the dusk and the dawn The start and end of the day and sometimes even noon in between. Love that puts stars in your eyes the pink blush of sunrise across your cheeks. Love like waking up.

i.a.s. // love like you // 1.11.16

[tulipdoodles]

“Always” is flawed. You can’t make promises that are supposed to last forever. You can’t promise to always pick up someone else’s pieces if you’re the reason they’re breaking.

i.a.s // excerpts from a book i’ll never write #8

[tulipdoodles]

i crave the sting of foreign salt in my veins home doesn’t hold the warmth of the waves

1.10.16

[tulipdoodles]

i. Socks, bare skin against Rustling sheets and tired hands Yawning, back to bed. ii. Everything lacks Changes in the winter sky Days of sunshine end. iii. He is evening dusk Body broken by morning Never yours to keep. iv. Best memories lost Scrapbooks boxed in the attic She was just your past. v. Quiet the slow breath Gone are the stars in my eyes Suck the life from me. vi. Set it all ablaze Burn this body, melt it down Ashes to ashes.

i.a.s. // six haikus for the past six months

[tulipdoodles]

You have to trust him. Even if you know he’s going to break your heart, you need to trust him with every ounce you have.

i.a.s // excerpts from a book i’ll never write #7

[tulipdoodles]

“Love takes a long time to develop,” he says. His eyes are either blue or green. I love them like I love the sea, like I love the tides and the waves, nonstop movement, a push and a pull. “Love is overrated.” He’s running his hands through his hair. I love his hands; the way his fingers rest on my spine, the way his palms cup my face. “Love is hard.” The words leave his lips with ease. I love his lips on my neck, on my cheeks, on my fingertips. I love his lips spilling his thoughts with so little effort, breaking my heart without trying. “I love you!” he exclaims. He isn’t even thinking about it, looking into another girl’s eyes, laughing with her across the parking lot. He tells me he doesn’t mean it, that it isn’t real love. “What is real love?” I ask. “Why don’t we have it?

i.a.s // three words, eight letters

[tulipdoodles]

You can’t just let go?” He isn’t even looking at me. He can’t look at me. “It’s been a year. Why can’t you just let go?” The truth is that I wasn’t trying. I couldn’t look at him and see anything but the best summer and the worst winter. I couldn’t look past the six months of technicolor days even though he saw all of our black and white nights in my eyes. I wanted our long days back, a summer over fast in the flash of a camera, no more white noise, cricket conversations. But every good memory was now rotten, like a peach so perfect it goes uneaten until it spoils in the sun, so perfect that it was bound to be wasted. In the end that’s what our love was, so flawless and perishable that it went to waste. Maybe you knew that all along. That’s why you let go, why you tossed out our love like it was something rancid, why you insisted we kept our distance. Maybe you could see the hurt in my eyes before I felt it in my bones. Maybe that’s why you wanted me to let go.

i.a.s // you and me in my internal monologue: happy one year anniversary

[tulipdoodles]

10.28.15

[tulipdoodles]

In my head I pretend no one else has inside jokes or memories I pretend that she doesn’t give him butterflies And he doesn’t give her flowers And they’ve never kissed Or held hands And she doesn’t go to his house alone and they don’t talk They never really talk In my head they’re blank people Not a couple But instead a couple of people Labeled as dating Labeled as in love But not really anything but blank

i.a.s // blank people used to mean the world to me

[tulipdoodles]

I don't know how weeds can grow so confidently Filling cracks in the sidewalk and growing in patches by the freeway. I don't know how they can pop up anywhere and everywhere and still survive. How can grass take up space all over the world But I can't cross an ocean without feeling pulled out by my roots.

i.a.s. // grass is never homesick

[tulipdoodles]

My abandonment issues sit on the table, abandoned My forearms smell like a warm embrace and your timid laugh is echoing It keeps echoing How can I have these parts of you with me already Like in synch heartbeats and shared laughter Opposite sides of a kitchen table yet closer than ever I’ll see you soon or I’ll see you never Either way it’ll be until forever Best of luck; keep in touch

i.a.s // too close for long distance