A Love Poem

Sorry about the awkward spacing. It's what happens when I copy from Word...

A Love Poem

A fellow young poet

Once told me

“I don’t like love poems

They aren’t my cup of tea.”

Which I thought

Was a little sacrilegious

In the world of poetry

See, love poems

Are where it all started

Those poets who delved

Into worlds uncharted

And poured out their love

With hearts unguarded

Their hands dances across

As their emotion seeped

Into the page

All because of love

Because of the woman

Who walks in beauty like the night

Or who is far more rare

Than any belied by false compare

Those poets were the first

To make their mark

But not the last

To feel the spark

To be compelled to write

About love

There was the man

Who took the road less traveled

He was in love with

Taking chance

And, without a backward glance

Walked into the romance of

The unknown path

A love poem to life

Then there’s Shel Silverstein

Who loved nothing more

Than to make children laugh

With poems of the

Messy bedroom floor

Love poems to laughter

And Mr. Hughes

Whose poem for English B

Helped the world to see

That we’re not that different

You and me

Love poems to equality

And there a thousands more

Who found things to adore

Who wrote poems and rhymes

About far better times

In our world love looks

A lot more like lust

And wild-eyed men

Fight over the broken

Pieces of trust

So give me a love poem

I’d take it any day

Over an outlook on this world

That seems so gray

Give me a love poem

One that rings true

And maybe we can make

This world anew

Now on a scale

From 1 to over trusting

I’m pretty fucking naïve

But this is something

I’m willing to believe

Love is alive

I have no doubt

And that is something

To write a poem about

Generation Y

This is a poem that I'm considering for the Slam coming up this week. Let me know what you think and if there are any editing comments you have. Thanks!

Generation Y

Inspired by Howl by Allen Ginsberg

I saw the best minds

Of my generation

Seeking something

Worth something

Trying to weed through

The trash in a world

Where anything

That you no longer

Need is trash

Trying to weed through

To find the treasure

I saw the best minds

Of my generation

Self-medicating

Swallowing their sorrows

In a shot of whiskey

A shot of Smirnoff

A shot of – is that alcohol?

Hand it over

I saw the sons

Of my generation

Desperately trying to fill

The male ideal

Doing massive feats

Of masculinity

To avoid the possibility

That they aren’t

Good enough

I saw the daughters

Of my generation

Poking and pulling

Changing and rearranging

Afraid to grow old

Hoping to fit

The Beauty Mold

The best minds

Of my generation

Are quietly destroying themselves

In search of something

Of interest

They are longing

For meaning

A significance that

Lies beyond the surface

They are trying

To build a world

Of their own

A brighter world,

A cleaner world

A better world

A world that will

Shatter the shallow

Expectations of

Our forbearers

and the naysayers

the ones who whisper

doubt about our potential

I saw the best minds

Of my generation

Waiting for a rebirth of wonder

Chasing after beauty and truth

And full of an unassailable hope

What is Beauty? & Unrequited

These are two poems I recently wrote and need some help with editing. Please give me your thoughts.

What Is Beauty?

(I'm debating cutting this first stanza)
No one ever told me
That I was beautiful
Not in a way that
I’d believe it
See, it’s hard to believe
Words spoken out of empty obligation
Or misplaced jealousy
Because for every boy that said it,
I heard an alternate motive
And anytime a girl told me
“you’re so pretty” because I had
Some trait that was “better”
Than theirs, I was sitting
Wishing I had their eyes,
Skins, lips, body, laugh
Because no one ever told me
That I was beautiful

How do we define beauty?
Is it in the plastic smiles
Plastered on the plastic faces
Of the plastic people?
Is it the obsessively toned,
Tan bodies of the self-obsessed?
Or the painted skin on the
Painted faces of the girls
Too scared to move should
Their painted masterpiece
Sweat off and show
What’s underneath

Is beauty what’s shown to us
By the media, by those who came before us
Is beauty confined by
Societal restrictions?

See my definition of flawless
Is a girl who flaunts her blemishes
Her every imperfection
And dares the world
To take her as she is

And my idea of sexy
Is walking into a room
And caring more about
The people in it
Than what they’re thinking of you

And beauty is acceptance
It’s looking in the mirror
And saying “I am beautiful.
This zit. Beautiful.
These teeth, they’re beautiful.
This nose, beautiful
These eyes, beautiful.
This crazy, unruly hair. Beautiful.”
All of these things are beautiful
Because they make me, me.

I’m here to tell you something
Something that I believe
From the bottom of my soul:
You are beautiful.

And it doesn’t matter
What you see slapped on
The magazines or projected
On the tv
Because that’s not beauty,
That’s business



Unrequited

this poem is for anyone
who has ever loved someone
for those of us who
understand the fuss
of unrequited love
we get it,
we've been there

we brought you soup
when you were sick
we were there when
you needed a ride
we held your hand
through the 32 stitches
above your left eyebrow

we were you sympathy date
to that dinner event
and pretended to unwillingly consent
while all the while
we were thinking about how
great we could be

this is for the people
who know what it's like
to be perpetually in the
"friend zone"

we're the ones
who would move
Heaven and earth
for an hour of your time

we went on long walks
had deep talks
ad waited for
opportunity to knock

this is for anyone
who's listened to you
talk about the other
person for hours
because we love
the sound of your voice

we jumped at the chance
to be with you
and silently wished
you'd see through
our unsteady facade

this is for the people
who've sat by and watched
as you were with
the wrong one, wrong one, wrong one
all the while knowing
we're the right one

we were there for you whenever
you needed us and prayed someday
you'd realize we were forever

this poem is for anyone
who's stayed up all night
thinking about
what it could be like
what it would be like
what it should be like

For the unrequited lovers
because there's something
beautiful in the way
the ocean refuses
to stop kissing the shore
no matter how many
times it's turned away

for those of us
who loved the people
who never knew or
understood what we
would do for them

this poem is for anyone
who has ever loved someone

Full of Beauty

The world is full of beauty
when the sunlight pours through the leaves of the trees
onto the soft, cool grass

The world is full of beauty
when the moon rests contently in the dark folds of the sky
and the winking stars laugh as they dance in the Heavens

The world is full of beauty
when a baby laughs and leans forward toward the
loving arms of its mother

The world is full of beauty
when a woman runs into the lonely arms of a man
and they embrace; safe, secure, home at last

And the world is full of beauty
when a lamenting cry pierces the grieving air
and there is no comfort in solitude

The world is full of beauty
when bloody battles forever
change the face of the Earth

The world is a beautiful place -
we sing, love, laugh, dance
fell pain, anger, hunger, thirst
and live

The world is full of beauty.

Overdue

This is the last poem I wrote in Writer's Workshop. Enjoy

Ode to Writer's Workshop 5th Block 2010

Here I thought,
What am I doing,
this isn't me
I'm not that girl
who writes poetry

But it's like a compulsion
I can't stop this motion
of my hand as it
dances across the page

It must've been your words
that inspired me
filled me up
and let me be
whatever I decided
and I really haven't minded

Here, I broke out of my shell,
I figured, "what the hell?"
and just wrote
whatever I felt

Here, I learned to
tie words together in rhymes
that were so sublime
I learned to paint pictures in the air
and share them without a care
in the world

Here, I became an artist
a performer, a writer
a poet
a friend

Here, I learned that
I have the strength
to reinvent myself,
breaking free of all the
cried and ties and lies
and just
fly

Here, I learned that
sometimes, all we
need is someone to listen
and care about what
we have to say

And here, I found
that willing ear

Here, I found a little bit of home
And here, I leave a little bit of heart