I listen to the universe without a hint of defiance I listen carefully and with intention to understand my next blessing and the message is, continue to be vulnerable with the world you’re leaving a blueprint for the next one keep leaning into your craziest and most authentic self there’s someone somewhere who’s paying attention and may be falling in love with you one poem at a time but too scared to make a confession
my family is quiet about their sorrows they put up a mask of strength and resilience its not that they hide their tragedies they talk about it openly but heal with energy from the trees, with their busy and monotonous routines on their farm with the understanding that terrible things happen in their lives and finding resilience in the most extenuating of tragedies in order to move forward
me and my ex drive towards the moon in silence accepting we were always meant to be friends no longer harboring resentment about our failed story of romance Focusing on the long road ahead of us Divorced and raising kids in a world full of oxymorons, in a world that will try to make them fit into unrealistic expectations of what it means to be human me and my ex drive towards the moon in silence putting away our differences and any conflicts And putting our childrens’ best interest first understanding they’re the best thing to come out of the failure of us
sorry for sleeping with your husband I was raised better than to covet my neighbor’s spouse I knew better than to listen to my impulsive and drunk hormones and while I could say I was caught up in the moment of music and alcohol it’s not an excuse for the sin I committed it’s a misdeed that I still regret 22 years later because I hate to think that maybe I was the final straw that broke up your marriage because guilt sits at the bottom of my stomach wondering if I wrecked an otherwise happy home and ruined an epic love story and if it eases your mind karma did get me in the end I married the wrong person and suffered through toxic codependency and polyamory Eventually having a mental breakdown because of how overwhelming it all got and ending up divorced with me alone without any romantic prospects I learned 22 years too late what is done secretly and illicitly in the heat of the moment comes back later to haunt you comes back to haunt your subconscious in dreams until you’re ready to acknowledge it and make amends
my culture is not up for appropriation, my culture is not up for colonizers to profit off from it I can hear my ancestors cursing in their graves haunting white people in their dreams over the atrocity they’re committing it’s blasphemous to use their most sacred ceremony for the business of “healing” why must white people in 2023 continue to steal from the indigenous community? it’s the same white people who forced assimilation on us the same white people who made us give up our religion and traditions the same white people who shamed us for our indigenous traits and the reason I don’t know how to speak quechua today why can’t the white man stay in his lane instead of trying to profit from our culture and the insecurities of others how is it possible that in this day and age these so called enlightened and elitist whites are still fucking over the indigenous community?
even the spambot body shames me and I hate my body all over again wanting to eviscerate that pudge that’s been there since after my first son hiding the flappy wings of my upper arms wondering why God gave me my stupid curves I’m constantly trying to hide and every excess of skin I see in the mirror That makes me wish I’d cease to exist why can’t I be a skinny white girl? instead of this pudgy mess of a woman with body dysmorphia who still uses the scale to determine her WORTH
I have a bad habit of making poetry out of almost anything it’s annoying, it’s cringe, and downright embarrassing at times how shameless I can be it teethers between the line of genius and insanity This monster of creativity of mine from trauma to my kids to childhood memories To the latest villain in my story to office supplies To my dreams to the trees to the clouds To my kroger apron to energy drinks To that ex from my 20s No one and nothing is saved from being used as a fountain of inspiration for my creativity Sometimes it’s a curse, sometimes it’s a blessing Most of the time, it’s just downright entertaining
silence is no longer an option if I continue to do so, I’d be suffocating the part of me who needs to be heard in order to heal I’d be failing myself, my ancestors, and future generations silence is no longer an option to do so is an act of violence against the writer and poet in me whose purpose is tell my story, my truth
I bet all of my female ancestors still remember their third of december
abandonment wounds run deep in my bloodline I’ve lost count of how many woman in my family whose lovers absconded, who’s lovers left them for their own version of Heather- maybe this explains my epic overreaction every time a lover absconded their departure triggers trauma in my DNA from the abandoned women ancestors before me
this day inspired a poem titled, “My Last Heather Moment”
It’s the 3rd of December and that means it’s Heather Day! What exactly is “Heather Day”? It’s a lyrical reference to the Conan Gray song “Heather” which talks about unrequited love and his crush choosing some girl named Heather over him which is terrible because I still can’t imagine anyone choosing someone else over Conan Fucking Gray, the most beautiful man ALIVE! So the first time I heard Heather was around November of 2022 and in a few short weeks, I became obsessed with this song. I think my kids unintentionally know the lyrics because of how many times they’ve heard it. I’ve written poetry inspired by this song and read that poetry at open mic. I’ve posed in pictures inspired by the video of the song. I’ve blasted that song from my car at various times and have always sung it out loud when it would play over the loudspeakers at my second job.
Needless to say, I have a deep relationship with that song. I know that it’s because at various stages in my life, I’ve been dumped by my exes for someone else, my crush has chosen someone else over me, or in one instance, the guy I was kind of seeing brought the other girl to an event we were both at and he thought it was fine while I was having full blown panic attacks in the bathroom (that’s another blog post). Before I listened to Heather , I didn’t know what to call these gut wrenching moments but after “Heather” I call these moments “Heather Moments”. And I’m sure there are other people, who’ve had similar experiences and their own “Heather Moments” and so I made a playlist inspired by “Heather” with songs with a similar feel. I actually have a deep connection to every single one of these songs and have even seen a few of them performed live. Yes, I saw Heather performed live and it was the happiest 4 minutes of my life! Anyways, here’s my playlist along with a few of the poems inspired by the song Heather. Fun Fact about some of these songs: 1) I was obsessed with “Can’t Let Go” when I was 10 and my crush wouldn’t notice me. 2) Look Away was on repeat in my CD Player when I broke up with my ex at 15 and it wasn’t a week before he went out with that girl he told me “I shouldn’t worry about” 3) One of the first songs I learned to play on the keyboard when I was 13 was “Words Get in the Way” 4) This is probably the most embarrassing fact but I crashed into the pole at work while I was blasting “Traitor” from my car. And 5) I was obsessed with the song “Silver Springs” this year and had it on repeat and even translated it into Spanish to see how it sounded. Also, I’ve included link via spotify and youtube for your listening pleasure.
I WISH I WERE HEATHER playlist:
Back to Black-Amy Winehouse
Better than Revenge- Taylor Swift
Can’t Let Go-Mariah Carey
Checkmate- Conan Gray
Coincidence-Sabrina Carpenter Dancing on my Own-Tove Lo Deja Vu- Olivia Rodrigo
Driver’s License- Olivia Rodrigo
Glimpse of Us- Joji
Good Enough-Maisie Peters
Heather- Conan Gray
John Hughes Movie- Maisie Peters Lacy- Olivia Rodrigo
Lookalike- Conan Gray
Look Away- Chicago
Lost the Breakup- Maisie Peters
Lucid Dreams- Juice WRLD
Movies- Conan Gray
Objection-Shakira
Opposite- Sabrina Carpenter
She’s All I Wanna Be- Tate McRae
Silver Springs- Fleetwood Mac
Slow Dancing in the Dark- Joji 24.Taste- Sabrina Carpenter
in my island of solitude, I drift further and further away from romantic love when I’ve tried to invite others to my island they always left, and it drove me into hysterics making a catastrophic emotional mess of me so now I float alone on my island of solitude and have erected walls of strength and confidence around it I will not allow another soul to break them down only to later leave on a whim, leaving me in pieces once again