Speak the truth, even if your voice shakes.

Alyson Kemp. 21. Lost Wanderer. Novice Poet. Pseudo Adult. Cat Lady.

[unsungchronicles]

In seven years every cell in your body will have died off and re-generated. That means I only have two more years in this skin with your fingerprints on it. Only 600 more days until my body forgets what your touch feels like.

[wastedwinter]

“It ends or it doesn’t. That’s what you say. That’s how you get through it. The tunnel, the night, the pain, the love. It ends or it doesn’t. If the sun never comes up, you find a way to live without it. If they don’t come back, you sleep in the middle of the bed, learn how to make enough coffee for yourself alone. Adapt. Adjust. It ends or it doesn’t. It ends or it doesn’t. We do not perish.”

— Caitlyn Siehl

[unsungchronicles]

“Day 115: I am still holding a grudge with the world for the way it has continued to spin in your absence.”

— Alyson Kemp

[unsungchronicles]

Day 1488. Still true.

[unsungchronicles]

A List of Things Worth Staying Alive For The feeling of the sun on your skin when you skip class on the first real day of spring The way coffee tastes in the afternoon with your mother The sound of your nephew’s laugh when you tickle him The flame of a new loves skin pressed against yours The warm chills you get when a song sounds like a memory The scratch of your father’s mustache when he kisses your cheek The quiet magic of Christmas lights in the snow The pride of waking up another morning. And then another. And then another. You’re still here And you deserve to be.

Alyson Kemp , “In Case You Have to Convince Yourself”

[unsungchronicles]

In the dream, I am careless— Reckless, and with the worst of intentions The longing in my teeth is blinding I have to taste your clementine skin You linger on my blackberry smile In the dream, we are thieves— Taking what doesn’t belong to us Remorse a language we don’t speak Your hips on my hips is the only Bible we know In the dream, it is dark outside— The glow in our hungry bellies In our greedy palms Is the only source of light In the dream, we are all that matters— No explanations No apologies No one else The bed catches on fire And it is still not as warm As us

Alyson Kemp, In The Dream

[cgcpoems]

in a language that doesn’t have the word ‘love’ I say

“I still have the receipt from the film we watched on

our first date” I say “I bought four red sweaters after

you told me it was your favorite color” I say “it’s been

exactly two hundred and twelve days since our last kiss”

I say “last week, in a hotel room, the complementary

pantene shampoo was the type that you use” I say “I walked

around smelling like you and nobody else cried over it”

I say “yes, I’m still crying over it” I say “the other day

somebody’s ringtone went off in class and it was the same

noise you set for your alarm and it took me a minute

to figure out where I knew it from” I say “I’m terrified

of someday not knowing where I knew it from” I say

“every poem I write nowadays is about the same thing”

I say “I’d almost give up writing altogether if it meant

we could try again” I say “please” I say “please” I say

“please.”

another untitled poem where I’m exceptionally loud about how much I love people // WRITTEN BY CAITLIN CONLON

[unsungchronicles]

I keep looking for you in the skin of other men. Not here Not here Almost, but never here

Alyson Kemp, “He Has Hands Like Yours”

[unsungchronicles]

All my pieces want to come together as mosaic for you, but there's nowhere to put this art.

Alyson Kemp, “When He Already Loves Someone Else”

[unsungchronicles]

I can't stop counting all the times that I almost got everything I ever wanted. All the times I got close enough to happiness to smell its perfume but just a little too far to kiss its neck.

Alyson Kemp, “This One is About You”

[unsungchronicles]

I'm selfish and greedy. These hands are always grabbing at hearts that shouldn't be mine.

Alyson Kemp, “Greed”

[prospects]

[unsungchronicles]

I wake up in the morning clenching my jaw and my fists My subconscious desperately willing you to be in my grip I haven’t showered since the last time we kissed because with your sweat still under my nails I can pretend that you haven’t already forgotten about me You see me at the bar and call me baby girl My friends raise their eyebrows when you run your hands through my hair and I hope they don’t notice those same hands rub the shoulders of the blonde four bar stools down You don’t care that I saw After all you swore I’m your favorite You like my picture on Instagram but never texted me back when I asked "why aren't you in my bed" This is why I always try to leave before I am left Because when you go first I have nowhere to run but in circles Going crazy over a boy that won’t love me isn’t my style but I found this in the back of your closet and somehow it fits On our first date I told you this was all a game to me and you laughed because you knew you played it better I guess this is what I get for showing my cards too soon.

Alyson Kemp, “Poker Face”

[unsungchronicles]

Missing you tastes like gun powder And anything could ignite this aching. My mother tells me I’m better off, Says men aren’t meant to be bonfires. But isn’t love just kindling? Isn’t love just an inferno to be survived? I don’t know any other way but to burn.

Alyson Kemp , “Comparing Love to a Disaster. Again.”

[brittneymelvin]

you were fifteen when your father took his fist to your face and hissed,‘you will always be nothing.’ i met you nine summers later,and you were still trying to wash the soap out of your eyes,  the black and blue out of your veins. i wasn’t made to love men like you, men who taste like cigarettes. men who kiss you one minute just to forget your name the next. men who take lots of women and lots of drugs. despite all that,we were really something on those sweltering July nights,laughing in lyrical synchronicity as if  singing hymns to the holy night sky. i’m no longer mad at the moon for coloring you my favorite shade of yellow. all that softness on your skin brought me the most sacred satisfaction. even if it was just a trick of light, even if it was just the glow of grand illusion. whenever i put on my lipstick, i rarely think of you kissing the red off.i put on my perfume, seldom musing over how much you seemed to like it. on Thursdays i go to the grocery store,and i smile at the handsome strangers who send me shy hellos in the cereal aisle.on Saturdays, i flirt with fire in my teeth, chasing cosmos and kamikaze shots with foreign tongues who taste nothing like you. on Monday mornings, i tell my coworkers of all the new men i meet and the poetry I’ve penned with their names now making homes in my margins. still, when those words your father sold you ten summers ago wake you up gnashing their teeth and threatening to swallow you whole, and you find yourself sulking in some dark corner cloaked in 3 AM apprehension, afraid to to be awake,afraid to figure out if your existence ever meant a thing, i hope you look out your open window. i hope you let the moonlight fill you up the way it did the nights i thought i might have loved you, let that light love you a way mine never could, let its softness serve as a reminder from both the universe and me: you were never nothing, and you never will be.

“you were never nothing” by brittney l. melvin (via brittneysays)

[unsungchronicles]

I can't stop writing love letters to the girl I used to be. I can't stop arm wrestling with the woman I'm turning into. No one warned me there was this much struggle in growing.

Alyson Kemp

[unsungchronicles]

Sometimes I think God will never give me a daughter because its only taken me 22 years to make a mess of myself  and he knows one windstorm of a girl is enough for my family tree. He knows that I’m the kind of girl who spills black coffee on her brand new shirt within minutes of putting it on. He knows some people just can’t have nice things.  But if God ever did give me a daughter  I think I could make her strong. I would teach her to wear the coffee stains on her shirt like a fashion statement. I would teach her that its ok if she’s messy because life is messy and scary and hard, and if you manage to keep your head above water then who cares if you haven’t brushed your hair in three days. I would teach her that loving someone is the bravest thing a girl can do, and it never gets easier, but it gets warmer every time. I would teach her that loving herself is not a virtue, not a novel thing. It is a basic necessity, should always come second nature. I would teach her that not everyone deserves a second chance, or the benefit of the doubt, because tragically, some people are just bad people. But then I would teach her that some people are good, so good, and urge her to always be one of them. I would teach her to cherish 17. To memorize its smell and always feel its heartaches writing in her bones. I would teach her to forever be that young and tender, to engrain in her soul the person she wanted to be at 17, to hold that woman close, get to know her, strive to be her, never lose her. I would teach her to go to the world fiercely. Look it in the eye, shake its hand. The world can be so scary.  If God gives me a daughter I will teach her to never be afraid. Hopefully by then I will have learned this myself.

Alyson Kemp, “Be Brave”

[unsungchronicles]

I am guarded. I am rock. I am fortress. I am city with walls, gates manned, armies strong, no one in, no one out Softness is not my nature. Love me anyways. Hardened soil can be transformed to give life if only a farmer will take the time to till it And I've heard the sun is trying its damnedest to melt the polar ice caps and everyone says its winning. I can't make any promises but maybe if you hold me long enough some day I'll melt too. We could be the couple on the subway. Her head on his shoulder. His hand on her knee. Eyes glowing, bellies warm, destination irrelevant. We could. I could. I could love you like that. But then again maybe I'm lying. I don't love in motion. There are no butterflies here. No fire kindling. I am bared teeth, strong front, brave face, running scared. I am a train you'll miss even if you showed up on time because somehow the schedule was wrong. Say one thing, mean another, want love, always leave. Perhaps this is why no one tries to climb these walls. "Keep out" painted over the welcome sign, like traveling to Greenland and finding only ice. I name myself home hope the world will see a retreat but my walls are bare. Want them to admire my art but keep the lights off. It seems like winter may never end. It's gray out all the time and it won't stop snowing. I miss my favorite dress. The one with the flowers that flits when I walk. But I digress. Or do I? See, I've been winter for so long and its not that I'm enjoying the blizzard, It's just that I don't know how to make the sun come out. I miss that dress, but I'm not even sure if it fits anymore.

Alyson Kemp, “Love Me Anyways”