All the poets that you love listening to
love lying to you.
I’m not that egocentric to make you believe that I’m not one of them.
I lie all the time,
mostly up here.
See, I’ve been doing this for a little while
and I’m starting to understand things:
poetry is not about telling you the truth.
It’s about telling you the version of a story
that gets the most reaction,
the one that flows the best on the mic,
the one that has all the lines
that the audience is going to like.
See, maybe the truth
isn’t supposed to rhyme so well.
Maybe it doesn’t have to rise to a crescendo.
The truth
never sounded like sound bites
and name dropping.
I promised myself I wouldn’t write poems about poetry,
but I woke up at 3 AM the other morning
and started spitting out all these lies that I couldn’t roll off my tongue
and thought that maybe at this hour
I could write a poem about honesty
without having to choreograph the hook at the end.
I woke up at 3 AM
and I’m having trouble remembering how to spell the word “wouldn’t”.
Four years ago, I featured at a youth slam in Jersey City,
and tried to show some children how poetry is supposed to sound cool.
Jessica sat in the front row
thinking I could teach her about spoken word.
I lied to her, in metaphor, for a half hour
only to hear the silence of a fifth grade explosion;
Jessica explained it to her thirteen year old peers
how rough her father’s beard stubble felt when her was drinking
and how a foster family is just a fresh coat of paint over stucco
when you’ve been running against the wall.
She didn’t actually say all this.
Not like I can.
But I could hear the inhalation of truth
in between breaths of her poetry.
Her name is not really Jessica.
I don’t remember what it is.
But for a moment, I can make you care about her,
even if she’s not real.
Don’t ask me.
You wouldn’t know the difference anyway.
I don’t write poems about honesty.
I’ve written three poems this year to make me sound cute to girls,
but not one about the medication that I’m taking
because there are some things
that I don’t fucking talk about.
Why am I 33 years old and still trying to sound cute to girls?
A couple weeks ago,
two friends asked me how my roommate is doing.
I use the word “roommate”
instead of referring to her as the girl I’m afraid of falling in love with
because she is the most beautiful overturned school bus that I have ever seen
and I slow down sometimes to watch the trauma.
And because she knows me.
Like how she knows that I look in the mirror too much,
and I always eat the last peanut butter cup,
and I fuck girls with my poems,
and use the word “roommate” too loosely.
And the poet in me
should’ve told them she’s doing just fine,
but I hadn’t memorized all the lines yet.
My best friend is not doing fine,
and I can’t fix it.
The students in my class
like me because I say the word “bullshit” during my lectures
and let them out early.
They don’t see that fear has me losing focus on the bullet points
when I’m thinking about how many slit wrists I’ll return home to tonight.
My roommate’s not suicidal
But it sounds sexier than saying
that she closes her eyes sometimes
when she’s changing lanes.
I lie.
Because it keeps me driving to work
instead of holding her all night and crying.
I need somebody to talk to
but poetry helps you meet people who want to fuck poets.
Who do you talk to when your best friend is biting off her cuticles,
while other girls are sharpening their nails?
I need to go to bed now.
I’m sorry I lied.
I’ll write the rest of this poem tomorrow,
when I can differentiate what’s none of your fucking business
and write poems with hooks that rhyme.
It doesn’t matter what you believe.
I’m tired of being the strong one all the time.
I’m considering it. Maybe not. I have another blog—a URL I saved but never used so I’m deciding that I’m going to post all my writing and text posts on there.
The perks of that is so people from my school don’t follow me. (If you’re from my school and you’re reading this, don’t take it personally. I’m just the kind of person who wants to keep their writing blog as some sort of a journal. One that is anonymous, if you get me)
I’ll still update this blog from time to time. Who knows what would happen.
This is actually a big deal for me. I’ve had this blog for 3 years now. I won’t part from it.. Not entirely. I don’t think I’ll delete, I’m not ready for that yet lol.
If you still decide to stick around though, I just want to thank you. And to all those followers who have messaged me in support, encouragement and simply with kind words.. Thank you so much.
David, I don’t know if you’ll even read this or if you still check up on my blog,
but I love you, okay? And I’m still thinking about you. I hope you’re doing well out there.
Wherever you are.
Finish that book for me. Make sure you put me somewhere within those pages. Read The Glass Castle. Write a fragment or a short story on a napkin at a diner and leave it behind for someone else to read. Stop in the middle of the crowd while walking down the street and look up. You can’t see it, but there are constellations of legends: Taurus, Gemini, Virgo, Pisces. They are shining just for you.
Look at yourself in the mirror.
And smile not for me, but for you.
Bye everyone. I promise I’ll continue to update this blog. I’ll be around.
- Jessie
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Maybe I should become an ancient goddess and live amongst the stars. Maybe then, maybe from the shoulder of Orion, I can find someone who would tell me their secrets too.
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You know what’s the funny thing? There I was sitting in such a fancy house, with people serving cups of carrot and celery with ranch on silver platters, with white carpet and a high ceiling, but instead of enjoying it I felt a longing to go outside. So I sat there alone, looking out at the woods in front of this house, wishing I were there barefoot instead of wearing pounds of makeup and heels. Suddenly I start thinking of the trail, the shy turtle, Jasper, and how my friend Tito or Brax or Dana would make me feel much better if they were there.
It felt like I lived in a separate world, one I didn’t belong in.
It sort of felt like I spent most of the day alone. Did it? I couldn’t tell. I wandered in the halls of the school after pre prom. I wandered in the darkened hallways finally barefoot. It was nice and I liked it because it was a place I wasn’t familiar with. But I managed to get comfortable with my boyfriend’s friends and they were lovely people. One of them reminded me of my old friend Kendall and that made me feel a little sad.
(Most of Jake’s friends had such pretty eyes I was afraid I stared at them for too long)
I think out of all of them though I liked this girl Caroline the best. She was the one who stayed and talked with me a lot.
Out of the whole thing however the only best and my favorite part of it was when two other girls and I went to the dance floor and started dancing to “You Belong With Me” by Taylor Swift”? And I was happy, so so happy because it took me back to my first sleepover with my old friend. I loved it. I wore heels and I loved it.
Overall it wasn’t bad. It could’ve been entirely better? Because for most of it I just watched a couple sit next to me with the girl on the boy’s lap ((((oh god I’m sorry they were really cute okay)))) I don’t know how envious I was so I just made paper cranes throughout. Maybe I’ll get to a thousand by summer.
But by the end I turned out to be extremely happy because i found someone who could take me and watch The Great Gatsby with me at like 12am!
So that was the nicest part of the day. Seeing that movie and with someone who had better music taste than the DJ at prom.
It wasn’t even bad which I’m surprised with.
I finally had deep conversations with someone after wanting to find a person to have them with all night.
We decided to lay on top of the car and stare at the sky (I had my sweater then and I was glad about that). I told him everything that happened, even about Caroline and Teddy and Craig. He told me about college and what he missed.
Basically the rest of the night (or early morning) consisted of reminiscing. I missed him a lot.
It was really fun because I also told him I never had my slow dance. We tried to find an appropriate slow song on the radio but there weren’t any??? So we ended up slow dancing to a station that played classical music. (It was horrible) He taught me how so now I at least know what to teach Jake.
We were supposed to drink since I missed a party and my friend had a bottle of vodka left over in his trunk but I decided against it because it was already 4am.
I’m sorry this was a long post. I’m just extremely happy that the day got much better by the end.
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