I wrote this poem in May of 2023.
old trauma wounds swim up to the surface
Triggered by a thoughtless comment
a dismissive action
and I speak up this time instead of holding it in
But I’m ignored
as if my hurt feelings mean nothing
But this time, instead of letting it go
and going with the flow
I reciprocate the same dismissive energy
because the version of me
Who’d allow herself to be run over
just to be accepted no longer exists
I wrote this poem in May of 2022.
My aura is a bright orange red
it means I’m passionate, it means I get angry easily
it means I have the most intense energy
and while I joke how my soul is black
my aura tells a different story
It tells a story of a woman who loves hard
who’s an emotional mess at times
Who fosters a unique strength and resilience to go on
Who’s a fucking Goddess
I wrote this poem in May of 2023.
hold me until I forget about how this story usually ends
With me having a meltdown and crying
and you leaving cause you can’t handle it
Hold me until I find enough courage to trust you
to be vulnerable and soft with you
Hold me until you make me believe in love again
I wrote this poem in May of 2022.
I want to scream, I want to cry
I want to throw myself off the precipice of some cliff
but faith whispers to me
“You will not always feel like this”
and slowly I begin to piece myself back together
and It’s hard at first because I don’t know where to start
Because so much in me is shattered and scattered
But somehow I know that faith is by my side
and hope will quickly follow
and I won’t always feel so lonely, so hopeless
I wrote this poem in May of 2023.
I didn’t mean to, it wasn’t in my plans for self improvement
But I fell for you in spring
I don’t even know when it started to happen
All I remember is absolutely hating it
hated how soft and corny it made me
hated how I started smiling at your messages
hated how you started to melt my jadedness about love
and how I finally felt like love was a possibility for me
So this year I was able to do the napowrimo challenge last month in which I wrote one poem a day and posted it to my blog. For information about what Napowrimo is and where I got my prompts, here is the link: https://www.napowrimo.net/
I wasn’t able to do the challenge last year because I was in Peru and well, I was too busy enjoying my vacation to think about the challenge.
I did do the challenge in 2022 and I can definitely tell a difference in my poetry from that year to this year.
Here’s that blog post: https://wordpress.com/post/lifeonthebpd.com/3708
So a few things I have noticed in my poetry this year is I’ve gotten stronger in using imagery, my vocabulary is way better and I’ve even written some funny stuff.
Here’s one inspired by Yung Gravy that I loved and read at open mic:
Another thing I noticed is that I’m getting better at telling a story through my poetry and here’s an example of this, this one is also one of my most vulnerable poems that I loved:
I will admit that not all of my poems were “good poems” and I’ll also admit that there were some days that it was hard to stay on task doing this daily since I do work 60 hour weeks but my discipline and determination won and even on the hardest and busiest of days, I still manage to write and post a poem. Also, I was determined to use the prompts from the napowrimo site and at times those prompts were challenging. However, I still used those prompts to the best of my ability. Also, when I did the challenge in 2022 I said something about turning off my internal editor and writing the poem and posting it right away. While I did turn off my internal editor (somewhat) when I wrote the first draft of the poem, I actually edited that first draft after I wrote it. I wrote a second draft in my journal and that’s what I posted in my blog. This shows I’m growing as a writer as I’m editing and paying more attention to what I post. I think one of the major reasons I’ve grown as a writer is because I’ve found community with other poets online and in real life. One thing I thought a lot about as I was doing this challenge was my audience. My friend Alex (another poet) told me that when he writes his poetry, he thinks about how it will sound while reading it to an audience and that really stuck with me. I know I’ve said so many times, “I write for myself primarily” and while that is still true, I think that in order for me to build community I need to also think about my audience and my readers. I don’t think this takes away from my authenticity at all; I think I’m just growing as a writer who aims to become better.
My advice to anyone who’s thinking about doing the challenge next year is do it for yourself and be gentle with yourself. Understand you don’t have to post it if you don’t want to and use any prompts available on the internet. As I look into doing this challenge this year, I’m thinking of making my own prompts in Spanish and English for anyone interested in doing the challenge.
I hope that next April when God willing I do the napowrimo challenge again I’m better at my craft and I can inspire some of my fellow poets to do the challenge with me.
aqui esta versión en Español:
poesía: loba
I’m a lone brunette wolf in a world full of blonde sheep
my exes always preferred blondes over me
I never knew exactly why
perhaps blondes really do have more fun
perhaps blondes are easier to manipulate
this used to bother me greatly,
even robbed me of my sanity and sleep
but eventually I had a great epiphany
the one meant for me will not just love how sweet I can be
He’ll also love and encourage the savage in me
he’ll know how to ride the turbulent waves of my mood swings
I’m not sure if I’ll meet him soon or if he even exists
but after this grand epiphany
I no longer care about my exes and their blonde sheep
In fact, I wish them all the best fairytale ending
I wrote this poem in May of 2023.
the end of the fiscal year brings out the worst in me
it crushes my soul and creativity
and makes me want to run into the woods and go feral
but my kids need food and shelter
so I put all of my distress tolerance skills to use
and my try my best to emotionally regulate my anger
and the fire that burns inside of me
hide behind phrases “okay, I’ll get that done”
“no worries” and “it’s no problem at all”
when I want to tell everyone to fuck your purchase orders
and spreadsheets
but sigh-I like my nice car
and Alexa playing Olivia Rodrigo in the morning
so I hold everything in
because I desperately need this paycheck
it sucks to be held hostage by capitalism
I wrote this poem in April of 2022.
Dear future heartbroken me,
Sometimes it won’t be you or even him
Sometimes things don’t work out
It’s nothing to be obsessed about
Sometimes love isn’t enough
It doesn’t mean you’re not enough
Sometimes things end abruptly
and it’s not the end of your story
and sometimes you learn from it
And most of the time
it will serve to change your narrative
I wrote this poem in March of 2023.
Finally comfortable in my skin
I’m no longer afraid to show off my majestic beauty
my curves comes one of the seven wonders of the world
and my face is a mosaic of my colonizer and indigenous ancestry
and now I grace the world with my beauty
posting endless selfies in various poses
some people may find it narcissistic
but if you possessed my goddess beauty
would you try to hide it?
I wrote this poem in March of 2023.
lately I try to be a bigger person but last night was different
running into you when I’m at my hottest,
when I embody the picture of an Incan goddess
felt like sweet revenge,
it felt like karma served to someone who made me feel small
it felt like the universe smiled on me showing me once again
how I am winning and that anyone who’s fucked with me
will get what’s coming for them
and while I did feel sad for you
because of everything you went through
I still felt like a queen, a goddess with confidence
oozing from me
compared to you who will never fit into the new me
Life on the BPD 