Holiday Cleaning…BLECH!
However, sometimes you can stumble upon some things you haven’t seen in a very, VERY long time. Those cupboards and shoe boxes can take you back in time. The only problem is, you most likely won’t end up in Narnia.
As first loves go, mine was a real shit storm of awfulness. I was naive, wide eyed and very inexperienced as a young woman. I thought I had it all together but…HA! Of course at the time, I had no idea how awful it really was. Mine may have been the textbook example of the sweet young girl swept off her feet by the bad…and I mean really, really bad boy.
Without going into the gory details of what was a horrible chapter of my life, I wrote…a LOT of poetry. Some of it was so awful that after discovering it today, I disposed of it immediately after reading them.
Two of them however were especially interesting. One kind of set the stage. The other, symbolized closing the curtain…and burning down the theater.
In reality, it took a great deal of emotional and physical damage to actually close that curtain for good but as we always say, all of our experiences, both good and bad, are what formed the people we are today. I suppose it’s okay for me to wish I’d have opened a different tub of clay though isn’t it? I mean, I still don’t know what the lesson was in living inside of that nightmare for almost two years. I have to believe there was a reason though and that somewhere deep down, those scars are doing me a world of good.
So, with that being said, welcome to my lovelorn, damaged, scarred and tortured 19 year old brain. I refuse to believe my heart had anything at all to do with this horrific experience. Yes, it really was that bad.
Remember…I’m not saying these poems are good. I’m saying they came from somewhere genuine and very deep that I am so grateful I didn’t have to live through twice.
Those Three Words
Do you say it with a dry eye or do you say it with a tear?
Do you say the words with a hesitant voice and shaky lips or do you kiss the words into reality and then whisper?
Can you blink and turn your eyes to the moon and feel what your heart cries out to speak?
Might you try laughing freely, giggling the phrase and have it dance off your tongue–each word a fancy new step you’ve been dying to try and you’ve finally found the right tune to do it to?
Should you say it to yourself and hope that he hears it through your hands as they touch him or while your heart beats against his when he holds you tight?
Are the possibilities endless and the horizons of your dreams unreachable or is it really easy and effortless to speak the words you long to experience?
You cannot hear these words for they are more than the ear can compel or the brain can comprehend, the flesh can feel or the heart can contain.
They reach into your soul and grasp the life that flows through your veins.
They travel throughout your body, never leaving for all eternity, if it is real.
The creator himself may claim the occasion when these words are spoken but once they enter your soul, if it is true, honest and everlasting, no matter how they get inside, they will always mean…
I love you.
Now…down comes the curtain. Be afraid…be very afraid.
STOP!
Like slivers of ice invading my blood
Each one sharper than the one before as they weave their way through my body and into my heart
They keep on moving through me
They strike every nerve, tendon, muscle and bone
My flesh feels like a lump if crawling insects, chewing on me until I ache all over
My guts are mush, melting and yet frozen in a sea of endless pain and torture
They keep making me cry and hurting me and they
never
STOP!
Author P.S. Bartlett 
Hugs to the 19 year old from me too..thank God you got out of that harrowing experience and emerged stronger and we now have the wonderful writer we have now.
Thank you and that 19 year old thanks you too. 🙂
the bad, bad boy….yea. good girls like bad boys… and just so by the way the poetry is awesome. yes, I’d like to think we learned a lesson with those horrible things that happened. I’d like to think I became less naive and saw more the realities of the world. While I’m still a dreamer and still very much naive (this is just who I am) I think that it has made me grow as a person and helps me empathize with all kinds of situations.