Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Harley Ginsberg Aug 2014
my misread compass
-harley ginsberg

obsessing over what I wanna do
making decisions for me
and solving my problems too
why can't you just leave me alone
I need a thinking place and some time of my own
need tons of space away from you
sick of being trapped in your zone
feel possessed by your power
too controlling for me
I'm just a broken hearted soul
keep taking advantage of the
tears in my eyes rolling down my cheeks
as I'm screaming and running
I just want some peace
it's my own ****** up life
don't want you living in it
keep blowing out the flames of the candles I lit
and when I'm finally happy
you wanna know what you do?
you destroy it like a tornado
pretending you had no clue
of the smiles on my face
the glow in my eyes
but it comes as no surprise
people say you mean well
but I know the truth
you planted yourself in me
from each toe to every tooth
and you use my weakness
to put yourself on a high
but I'm done with the sorrys
and every single lie
I know better now
then to sit and watch it happen
I know not to give you any satisfaction
you take it all from me and leave me with nothing
you break my heart at the push of a button
and as I'm trying to push away all the pain
it's always gonna be the same
and as blood trickles down my arm and through each vein
I'm trying not to go insane
cause you're stuck on my mind
for all the wrong reasons
leaves are in my path
falling for those changing seasons
wishing you would change too
and back away from me and my old life
and the way I was living
I'm done with never getting and always giving
I need love in return to mend my broken heart
but only thing you sending my way is dart after dart
they go through me like air but get caught in my lungs
now I'm choking on lyrics that can't even be sung
I want to forgive you believe me I do
but how can I let go of this when you're the only direction I knew
I'll be lost on my own
I'm so used to being guided by you
but it's on the wrong path
and I'll figure out what to do
so goodbye forever to my misread compass
I'm hopping in my own lane
I'll be okay
I promise
one of my more lengthy ones
Ashlea  Feb 2017
Misread
Ashlea Feb 2017
I am constantly misread.
By the way I speak,
The words I write,
And the actions I do.
Everything is analyzed in such a way, today
That there is no way around it.
We are criticized,
Yelled at,
Belittled,
Because of words we did not say.
But for the interpretations people take from our
Words we speak,
Words we write,
And actions we do.
Life was simple back then
When I wasn’t constantly misread.
Ayad Gharbawi Dec 2009
THE STORY OF SARA






Or A Reflection on Ourselves


Ayad Izzet Gharbawi










2008














Table of Contents



Chapter 1: An Awakening. Page: 3.
Chapter 2: University. Page 12.
Chapter 3: Being an Activist. Page 23.
Chapter 4:  The Hallowed Purification Programme. Page: 32.
Chapter 5: The Party Self Destructs. Page: 55.
Chapter 6: Confusion after the Collapse of my Icon. Page: 64.
Chapter 7 Getting a Job as a Psychiatrist. Page 69.
Chapter 8: Afim: Sick or ‘Normal’? Page: 84.
Chapter 9: Having Children. Page 105.
Chapter 10: Omar Again. Page: 109.
Chapter 11: The Meaningless Existence of My Husband. Page 121.
Chapter 12: My Daughter: Lara. Page 127.
Chapter 13: Getting to the Top in my Job. Page: 131.
Chapter 14: Success & Emptiness. Page 142.
Chapter 15: The Shock. Page: 148.
Chapter 16: The Trap. Page: 153.
Chapter 17: The Punishment. Page 162.
Chapter 18: The Barmaid and the Alcoholic Conversation. Page: 166.
Chapter 19: Old Age. Page: 180.
Chapter 20: Seeing My Son: Noor. Page: 184.
Chapter 21: The Unexpected Visitor. Page: 191.
Chapter 22: Conversation with my Social Worker. Page: 195.
Chapter 23: My Visitor Returns. Page: 206.
Chapter 24: Isolation. Page: 210.

















THE STORY OF SARA



– OR, A REFLECTION ON OURSELVES



CHAPTER ONE:  AN AWAKENING



  
            Sara is my name.
  I feel the need to write down the words, or rather, the connected and the unconnected stories, of my life.
  I wish to say straightaway, that I am not an important person; on the opposite.
  I am, in fact, a no one.
  I achieved nothing meaningful in my life, and I was never famous.

  So, why you may think, should anyone read about my life, considering that I am a nobody?
  Well, I think, that precisely because I am a nobody, people should read about my life!
  Why?
  Because, since most of us are nobodies, therefore, I must be a reflection for a significant number of people.
  I am a mirror that most of us do not see; after all, who wants to see what they really look like?

  You see, if I were famous, then I would be in the minority of the population, and, as a consequence, I would reflect the lives of just a small fraction of the people.
  In other words, if I were rich, and if I were to write about my life as a rich woman, then most readers would have absolutely nothing to relate to such a story.
  But then again, to tell you the truth, I am plagued by insecurities and self doubt.
Why am I plagued by insecurities and self doubts?
  Because life itself is full of doubts and insecurities!
  Everyday there are so many events that happen that you do not fully understand - and so they have no certainty.
There are so many thoughts that come across your mind that you cannot believe in with certainty - in other words, you have doubts!
  Life is made up of events, people and thoughts that are themselves uncertain, vague, indefinite, unclear, ambiguous and ultimately blurred.
  That is why, for me, I found no certainty in my life, no sense of definiteness – and the end result is that my image of my personal reality was a blurred vision.

  I could never see an accurate view of my own reality - because I had far too many flawed characteristics.
  I am extremely temperamental.
  I am extremely impulsive; I speak, behave and act without thinking in a sober, rational, deliberate manner.
  I am not a very good judge of character when it comes to people. I often evaluate people wrongly. I misread who they really are.
  I am often very cold with other human beings; I am unable to sympathise and be compassionate to other people.
  I am not a good listener.
  I am a slave to my irrational passions, my dark urges and my undesirable needs.
  Now I am not saying that I have these characteristics all the time – but I confess that I do have them far too often.

  And all these awful characteristics make me quite unable to focus on myself in a logical, coherent and rational manner.
  I am unable to see my real Self; I cannot see where my rational mind tells me where I need to go with my life, rather than where my dark passions tell myself where to go.
  So, maybe my story isn’t worth telling at all.
  Should I write the story of my life or not?
  Will anyone read it?


  I am a member of the weak and the unknown and the unheard class.
  I am a member of the invisible classes, of what they call 'Humanity'.
  Even though, I don’t know what ‘Humanity’ actually means any more.
  I am one non-entity amidst this ocean of Humanity.
  I am a nothing.
  So, what’s the point of my existence and, more importantly, the story of my existence!?


  Actually, sometimes, when I’m in a good mood, I think, yes, come, do not be timid or afraid, and take a serious gaze at my own face, and I hope you will see yourselves – yes, you, the majority of the people out there, this night; for when you see yourselves in my face, you may learn so much about yourselves, and it seems to me, after I have been living and experiencing so long, you may learn from my mistakes.
  It seems to me, that one of the problems so many of us people out there are facing, is that nobody seems to want to take a serious, unbiased way that they really look like – and this is because of fear.


  But what is this ‘fear’?  
  I know that this fear is one reason that causes a nagging and persisting unhappiness.
  This fear is because we are scared to look at ourselves and find a picture that is severely deformed and far too horrible to behold.
  Do you believe that looking at your own face is an easy task?
  I hear you tell me: Oh Sara, all you have to do is to look at the mirror and you see yourself.
  How easy!
  But, I’m afraid, you are wrong.
  Because when you say to me, that all you have to do is to see your face in the mirror, that is not accurate.


  And that is, because the face you are seeing in the mirror is an image.
  That is not your face!
  That’s an image of your face!
  And an image is only one degree of reality.
  An image is never and can never be the whole reality.
  So, you say, why is it that I am seeing an image of my face in the mirror and not the whole reality of my face?
  Because you yourself are scared to scrutinize and stare so deeply at your own face.
  Fear is restraining you from seeing your own reality.
  You may see your real face and it may be a face that is far too ugly to see!



  Now, when I am in a bad, bleak, hopeless mood, I really believe in the depths of my angry heart, that it is utterly pointless to write anything, precisely, because I feel that my entire life is completely worthless.
  Emptiness.
  I feel my life is filled with emptiness.
  Ha!
  How can you ‘fill’ anything with emptiness!
  You know, I feel like ripping to shreds everything I’ve written, and yes, reader, I’ve done that many times – and, then I start all over again.
  And how dare I presume that anyone out there in the world would be in any way interested to read the life of an empty woman who happens to be called Sara?
  You see, at times like these, I have self hate.
  I confess.
  I hate every single thing about myself.
  And that includes my pointless story.


  And so many times, especially at night, when I’m able to write my story, I think, what if no one is reading these words?
  How frightful!
  Could I possibly be that empty?
  Could I – Sara - possibly be so utterly meaningless as a human being, to the extent that no one could possibly be interested, to give me more than a few precious moments of their time, from their important lives?
  Well, for all you people out there whose lives are brimming with happiness; for all those of you people whose lives are so full and busy, so they never experience the utter tedium of boredom; for all those of you people who never face an inner emptiness, a loneliness within their hearts and minds; for all those of you people who have no fears, no anxieties, and no insecurities – then I can honestly tell you to hurl this book away!

  And, yet, I would like to believe that - in the depths of my shaky beliefs and my uncertain certainties - that I have at least one listener with me!
  You know why?
  Because it gives me so much comfort and peace of mind to think that I have one human who is interested to know me!
  The most horrible thing to me is to live in total isolation.
  And to ease that unique kind of emotional pain, is to know that someone, somewhere in this planet actually cares for you.

  I was born in the City, in a middle to low class neighbourhood, where families tended to help each other.
  It was a closely knit community. You knew everyone, and everyone knew you and so, when there was any problem, people would help each other out. You see, in this way, problems became less heavy than they would have been otherwise, because when more people come to help you, the problem weighs less, as opposed to if each family had to cope with their problems all on their own.
  It was a happy childhood; I adored my parents and I thought no one could be better than them.
  They were my icons.
  As a child, they were good to me, and I could see nothing wrong with them.
  But how long did that last?
  By the time my mind was waking up, so to speak, by eleven or twelve, I began to notice, that what I saw wasn't all that rosy at all. My parents used to argue a lot; Dad would scream and Mother would howl.
  And what were the causes of these clashes?

  Both were guilty of countless faults.
  Dad drank too much; Mom didn't pay enough attention to housekeeping and so our house was rather *****; neither parent paid any attention to us; Dad would always invite his 'friends', and they would be rather ****** in their behaviour and with their jokes (or what they thought were 'jokes'); Mom would go for hours on end to her 'friends' houses, and leave us children alone; so, when they were in the mood to fight, good God, both sides of the trenches had lots of reasons, or excuses, to use as ammunition!
  And what battles do we young children witness!
  Dad would scream: "What kind of Mother are you when you do nothing for the house; you don't cook, and so we never have homemade cooking; you don't clean, and so the house stinks and is always in a terrible mess; and then you disappear for hours to God knows where, leaving us all behind! How much time do you even spend with our children? I’ll tell you how long – you don’t spend any time with our children! Children need love, attention and time spent with them; how do you think that affects our children? Do you think that makes then happy?"

And Mom would scream, at the same time: "What kind of Father are you? You're always drunk, and you're always socialising with drunk, ****** idiots. How do you think our children are reacting when they see their Father interacting with the most lewd, disgusting people? You're lazy in your job – and that is when you keep a job more than a few weeks – and, not surprisingly, you don't bring in enough money, and so we live a miserable lifestyle. And, you dare to ask me why I leave this house for so many hours? Of course, I want to leave this house – it's because I cannot stand the repulsive sight of you! And then, you have the nerve to ask me, ‘how long do I spend with our children’? You **** hypocrite! How long do you spend with our children? Not one minute!"


  I would usually rush off to my room, and hide my body and soul in my pillow.
  And as I grew into a teenager, my parents were fighting against each other even more.
  Who was right and who was wrong?
  Sometimes I felt for sure, that Dad was wrong; and, at other times, I felt that Mom was to blame; while at other times, I felt both were to blame; and then again, at other times, I would be so confused that I just gave up thinking about the whole mess, and just wish they never brought me to this world.
  How could I judge them?
  I could never really tell, because I didn't have the facts, did I? Who knows if Dad really was lazy at his job, and if that was the case, why he didn't he realize that we needed him to work harder, in order for us to have a better quality of life? Or, maybe he wasn't making enough money, simple because his job was a low paying one, and so it wasn't his fault that he brought such meagre wages.


  Who knows why Mom didn't take care of the house?
  Maybe she was depressed?
  And who knows why she went off to her friends' house for hours on end?
  Put simply, when you don't have the facts, how can you possibly judge in a reasonable manner?
  But then, maybe, you, my dear reader, will say I am wrong, because one ought to judge the situation by using one's emotions and not just 'facts'.
  To be honest, when I think of those wretched days, maybe they were both 'right' and wrong'; but in what measures – don't ask me!
  What I do know for sure was this: the fact that both Mom and Dad never spent any time with me really hurt me and made feel insecure. I really needed their company when I was a child and right through to my adolescent years, but, unfortunately, they were never, ever interested to sit with me and talk to me – not even for a minute.

  In my teenage years, I clearly remember that I felt that I needed Mom and Dad, because I remember feeling frightened for the first time in my life.
  Why did I feel ‘afraid’?
  I honestly don’t know.
  Strangely enough, before the age of thirteen, all my parents' fighting did not leave me scared; no, my response was one of sadness only.
  
  So, I tried to talk with Mom and Dad, issues that were bothering me, but I found out, to my horror, that they could not answer any of my questions.
    I would ask my parents endless questions like:
"Should I continue studying in school and go on to university, or should I leave and get a menial job?"
"At what age should I get married?"
“Is marriage worth it or not?"
"Should I smoke cigarettes and drink alcohol – or, are these things wrong?"
  “What characteristics should I look for, when I make friends? In other words, what are the good attributes versus the bad attributes in the character of any person?”
  “What is morality?”
  I remember that my parents were themselves confused by my questions, and at the same time they were irritated.
And, at other times, they were increasingly bored with my unending questions.


  Strange combination, isn't it – to be both 'confused’, irritated' and 'bored' with someone nagging at you all the time!?
  I know why they were 'bored'; that's the easy part – it was because, they gradually found me to be a nuisance or an irritant with my questions.
  They were 'confused and irritated', because they felt stuck as to how they could best answer my questions.
You see, they were, themselves, doing all the wrong things, so how could they advice me to do what was supposed to be 'good'?!
  For example, 'Can I smoke and drink alcohol?'
Good question, Sara, but a question that you shouldn’t really ask your parents, when you recall, that both were heavy smokers and drinkers!
  And, when I asked them: 'Should I get married?' How can they answer that one
Silence is a hard thing to understand. It has a wide vocabulary, and sometimes rings out so loudly, as if a choir of confusion, that it is nearly impossible to translate. Sometimes it is so void of life that one cannot even hear one’s own heart beating. Silence is never the same twice, for it comes with different emotions and circumstances each time, even if seemingly the same, and it always has something new to unravel, whether it is what we need to hear, what we refuse to hear, or what we’ve been waiting to show, or trying not to show, ourselves or another, all along. Silence can be an ever changing friend, or an unrelenting enemy. No matter the form or fashion, silence is, and will forever remain, the most welcome and unwanted part of our lives.

It is an often overlooked truth that silence can be anything but. The voices echoing within the vastness between one ear and the next are still far more audible than anything exhaled amidst a mixture of lips, teeth, and tongue, so that even when we are not speaking our mind, the mind is speaking, even if only to the soul attached to it, speaking volumes silently as they translate into emotion and action, or the lack thereof, creating a vocabulary of gesture and expression, but also of stillness and blankness, woven together in both intricacy and complication, losing nothing in translation of language, but sometimes losing much in the heart’s translation of emotion to and from a soul other than its own.

Emotions are each a different language in themselves, for each has their own gestures, expressions, and blank stillness. The mind learns new languages by hearing and reading and teaches the mouth and fingers to translate from thought to spoken or written word, and it depends upon the exposure and the depth of study and experience in any given language as to which we become more or less fluent in, both in speaking and in understanding. It is much the same with the heart. It learns each new language of emotion by the experience of feeling, and depending on the depth and experience with each, the heart becomes more fluent in some over others, and sometimes one over any other. But, it is the relationship between the mind and the heart that truly allows us to understand these feelings, in others as well as in ourselves.

We say that it is the heart that guides us. We say to follow our heart. We say that our heart has been broken, or that it has been made whole. We say that our heart hurts, our heart leaps, skips a beat, races, that is swells and that it grows cold, or one of any other descriptive analogies. It is often what we feel inside our chest that dictates what we decide upon in our minds in any given thing of emotional importance. Poetry, literature, art, everyday speak, and even actions and expressions project and profess what it is that we feel in our hearts at any given instance or in any given circumstance. But, this is merely the hearts reaction to what our minds perceive in any given emotion of circumstance.

It is the depth of the understanding of any given thought or idea, fact or fiction, that ties into the emotional in any way or on any level for each of us individually. Depending upon what we think and believe about any given thing, it will have a different reaction in each of us depending on how important or unimportant it may be to each of us based on our individual way of thinking. The differences between what each of us considers important or unimportant has an influence on how each of us feels about any given thing or circumstance. It is our feelings about what and how we think and what we understand (or sometimes believe we understand) that are the basis, the origins, and the essence of our emotions.

The mind could not function if not for the heart performing its own function. In turn, the heart could not function if not for the mind. They are dependent upon one another. They are slave to one another. As long as the two continue to function together in any conscious state of awareness (or in some unconscious states), the mind literally controls the heart and the heart literally sustains and obeys the mind. The mind may decipher and understand what the heart feels in reaction to its thoughts, but it is the heart that feels it. This is why we speak of the heart and not the mind in almost every instance of emotion. This, however, does not mean that everyone’s mind understands the heart's obedience to the emotions created by the thoughts it produces, just as most do not realize it is the heart’s physical reaction in emotion that the mind relates its thoughts and feelings to unknowingly and descriptively. This lack of understanding applies more to the emotions emanating from others, be they audible or silent, than they do to the emotions we feel ourselves the greater percentage of the time.

How can this be so? How is it that the majority of the time, we misread, ignore, or completely overlook the emotions emanating from others when we feel those same emotions ourselves, and often express them in the same ways, whether more or less often, and whether we show our emotions deliberately, or they show despite our failed attempts at masking or hiding them? How is it that we fail to understand, or understand more fully, the torment or elation anyone other than ourselves can be going through at any given moment when we, ourselves, have been through the same or similar circumstances? Even when we have not been through the same circumstances bringing about such emotions in others, how is it that we have such a hard time understanding that the same emotions we experience can be brought about in others by completely different circumstances?

Maybe it is the amount of people who fake emotions to gain for themselves something from another in ill begotten ways so often that it becomes hard to believe what so many try to show or hide from us emotionally. Maybe it is that we are so often trying to understand those things in and for ourselves that we fail to see how those emotions affect others in their interactions with us and in their own lives. Maybe it is where some of the circumstances that bring about the same emotions for others are not quite the same circumstances that bring them about for us at times. Maybe it is where we are in a different state of emotion at times than the person or people we are interacting with, and our absorption in our own emotions takes our sight and understanding away from theirs at any given moment. It could be any one or more of these reasons, or even that we have had our own emotions misread and disregarded so many times that our own emotions have become so deep and ominous at times that we cannot see through the shadows that surround us or the elation we feel for ourselves in those moments. There are so many reasons that could be factors.

Even if we don’t feel the same emotions at the same exact time as someone else, or for the same exact reasons, we still feel the same emotions as everyone else, for despite each emotion being a different language, what we feel is universal. Despite the false witnesses of emotion who seek to deceive for whatever gain or manipulation they so choose, there are still so many good people trying to understand themselves, as well as others. In emotion, regardless of race or nationality or origin, we all speak the same emotional languages, even if some of us are more fluent in some emotions over others due to our personal experiences. If more of us would try, and some of us would try harder, to understand the emotions of others, not only from the circumstances bringing them to life, but in the effect each emotion has on each person in their moments of emotion, just as we so try to understand our own, then maybe, just maybe, there would not be so much confusion, misunderstanding, and in some cases, judgment, at the differences in what others feel and experience in any moment, whether similar or the same to our own, and hearts would heal more so than being broken, and we would see similarities over differences.

Despite how we live, where we come from, and who each of us are personally, we are all the same in what we feel in our hearts and through our minds, and even in our differences, we are still one in the same. Our minds control our hearts, and our hearts control our minds. We all feel, and we all feel the same, even if at different times than one another. Even when there are no words to say, and even when our words won’t bleed upon page or screen, or our emotions will not translate to whatever medium of expression we choose, our silence still speaks just as loudly as our words, for our every thought and action is based upon the language of emotion, and in that, we all speak the same language, even in silence.

Where it is so often that silence from another, or reflected upon another, determines our own understanding and emotion in interaction with the emotions of others, we should listen and try to understand more than just cursory what those silences reflect emotionally.  Sometimes, our silences speak just as much, if not more, than words or other mediums can allow, if we would but listen as closely in others as we do in ourselves in the languages of emotion, with our hearts and minds in equal measure, instead of letting our own emotions in our own circumstances at any given time impede or disrupt how we see or hear these emotions effecting others in their own circumstances, similar or differing, for they are something we should try to relate to, not self-sidedly compare to our own in trying to self-deceptively prove that no one understands how we feel.
It is one thing to write about such things in poetry or other forms, for we are describing our own personal experiences. It is quite another thing to allow ourselves to misunderstand, misinterpret, or ignore the emotions of others for any reason, especially because we have convinced ourselves that no one can hurt like we do or suffer as we have or are suffering, and it is often the silences that have the most impact on how we understand or misunderstand others. This is a thought that rambled on in the best of my understanding.
Ben Palomino May 2019
I converse with
The voices in my head

They talk slowly
So their guidance isn't misread
I have a few drafts. Not sure if it needs more or if short is better
Jonathan Oct 2018
That got your attention
Didn't it?
Even though I am a stranger
Who couldn't possibly know it to be true
And worth is subjective
Arbitrary
Those who know you would disagree
And point out your merits
And you would weigh yourself
To realise that not all parts are equal
Who am I to say such things?

And yet you take the time to read it
Reread, incase you misread
In reading you contemplate it's truth
You are my puppet, and me your puppeteer
How could you be such a sheep!

Why are you amused?
Why does insult carry more meaning than praise?

It's easy to hurt.
Sticks and stones may break your bones
But words can make you think you deserved it.
We are social beings and so
We look for validation
But insult stands out
It leaves a branded mark in our brains
And so we spotlight it
Unfairly
Unjustly

It's easy to be sad.
But it's fulfilling to be happy.
Being positive is hard
But it's worth it in the end.

How could I possibly know?
I couldn't.
But I do.
And soon you will too.

What are you doing now?





You are reading!

Now you are smiling.
You're Wonderful



Inspired by Dennis Willis's "You Are a Hallucination"

Sticks and stones line borrowed from xkcd's comic.
https://xkcd.com/1216/
Nayana Nair  Feb 2017
Misread
Nayana Nair Feb 2017
I have stacks and heaps of poems I have misread.

Where I filled the blanks

which were not meant to be filled.

Where I was supposed to stand stupefied by absurdity of life

I tried to find some order , some reason.

Where I was supposed to sit and listen to worries

I gave advice.Or worse, interfered in lives not mine.

It was always about what I could give to life,

than what life has given to me.

So I have suffered long

trying to fill silences in heart

and words in blank pages.

And never to have made a difference.

Never to have known the beauty

of being incomplete and unfinished.
Tiffany Palacios Feb 2015
Ripe, bitter, sour and oh so sweet.
Dangling off of a Californian tree.
Living within peels so stringent and
containing cascading juices so pungent.
He leaves you wanting, aching to know more.
He lures you in with the irresistible sweetest of enchanting
songs and ballads.
But what you didn't know was, that the ending
melody left you in a note that made you feel as though
you were drowning in a sea of rotten,
forgotten, and lost once loved dreams.
You became addicted to his freshness,
to the zest of his scent.
You became seduced, captivated even.
You let yourself become vulnerable
and susceptible to his touch.
You slowly opened up your wounds.
You let your friable bandages flow free.
You even let him lead the grand dance.
You let him twirl and spin you to the point
of reaching a state of trance or reverie.
He took you on romantic evening picnics,
he brought you to the oldest of antique boutiques,
and he even painted you angelic
mosaics in oil.
Ones comparable to those grandiose and imposing
works' of the masters.
At last he casted you under his spell
and he enticed you once again.
He had the charm of a thousand
and he was spontaneous in all his ways.
He never failed to surprise you.
They say he had an oriental descent
and this would explain much.
But when you least expected it,
he touched your wounds.
You felt an unbearable pain,
and a strange surge flow through you.
It burned, to say the least.
You almost felt your incisions
blister under the effect of his acid.
His yellow and aureolin tint
seemed only to be a facade.
An illusion, a charade to the naked eye.
But in that moment you could see through it.
You looked at him with pain-struck eyes,
full of confusion and disappointment.
You couldn't really identify the look in his.
You realized that he really had nothing to do
with his cadmium yellowish golden tint.
You felt as though you were fainting.
You were sinking and all the sweet
memories you two shared, flooded your
sight.
But then he said, "look at your wounds"
and you did as he ordered.
You looked down and shook off the stupor
and came back to.
You looked at your wounds and
became staggered and managed a mere "thank you".
For your wounds were no longer swollen and irritated.
He had healed you.
So when life hands you lemons,
don't make lemonade.
No, instead care for those
misunderstood beings,
and tend to their needs.
Because the lemons in our lives
are all too prevalent and far too
misread.
a poem- or spoken word written about lemons for my creative thinking class.
K G  May 2017
Meraki
K G May 2017
The basin drains her polluted blood as wine envelopes morose
Every minute is a memory, onset of her blanketed comatose
Vying in a fog of icons and myths, words always fail them
From every misread evil that is disposed of improperly
From every neighbor or friend eternally mute again
From every gilded pattern that leaves a cuff for the eyes
From every fetching barroom, where all such nadir lies
KG
Cursive attempts;
  simple words
misread
misinterpreted
mislead
every juncture
appendage
spins
dear readers
a web of confusion
blame not the spider
deceiving its prey.
to people with unreadable handwriting.
Anthony Smith Jun 2017
Tie her down and strike her
once, twice, thrice.
The pain is not her own,
leave her defenseless.

She gave up her freedom
when she stepped through the door,
So quick she was to lie on the bed,
yet the situation, she misread.

She struggles and moans
through a washing of crimson tears,
Yet would her release be allowed,
she would not go, it is not her wish.

In life she had sinned
and sealed her fate,
For eternity she shall remain,
as for her, it is too late.
Gene  Dec 2016
Untitled
Gene Dec 2016
I.
This is just another bad poem
Just vomited-thoughts-left-on-paper poem
This is a collection of grammatical errors
This would surely make my English teacher cringe
But no worries, I didn’t write this for her

II.
This bad poem is for you

May my subject and verb disagreement
remind you of all those misunderstandings that lead to raised voices
and nights where I cried myself to sleep

Sentence construction was never my strength, it still isn’t, maybe that’s why you never truly understood me—
called me difficult and bipolar
You said that I was too much

Did it ever occur to you that you might just misread me, like homonyms,
same words but with different meanings
misread my jealousy with accusations,
my concern for excessive affection

You said that I loved you too much
but darling, did you even love me at all?

Did I put too much meaning on your words,
turned them into similes and metaphors?
Turned your literal statements into figures of speech
You told me that you liked me,
so I blissfully interpreted it as a hyperbolic expression— called it love when obviously it wasn’t

III.
I was never good at using punctuations
I put too much commas,
unnecessary, misused, I kept trying to hold on
Afraid of the inevitable end,

Switched to semi-colons in an attempt to make it a few words longer

Because despite all our grammatical errors
no matter how shameful our piece of literature was to the English language

It was beautiful to the untrained eye,
To those who read poetry as it is
To those who don’t dig deep in search of true meaning behind the metaphors
It was beautiful to me

But I eventually learned that infinitives and infinities are different,
in spite of sharing infinite as the root word
Like our love,

started with something so promising
but unlike most novels,
there’s no happy ending

So I accepted defeat,
accepted the inevitable and bitter end
No more committing the same mistakes over and over again,
the same words over and over again,

Accepted the fact that synonyms existed,
words with the same meaning but also entirely different
new and unfamiliar, foreign and peculiar

IV.
I accepted defeat
No more commas or semi-colons
We have reached the couplet of our free formed sonnet—

I was never good with endings, I don’t think I’ll ever be,
So darling I hand you the pen, set us both free.
061016 / 6:36 pm
mio Feb 2021
orange sweater with wrinkled sleeves
it fits you perfectly. it looks like it was taylored to your measurements perfectly
i bought it about a year ago
let you wear a part of me i felt safe in
worn proudly you are the boy that i thought would never
i painted a picture of you in my head in which you were perfect
i had sculpted each pore perfectly
placed each thread of your hair on your head but
i guess i must have done something to mess up because the perfect picture i painted
dripped with wet unset paint
on top of me suffocating, i couldn’t move
i could only see your chest covered in the stupid orange sweater
tongue deep down my throat with your hand on my neck
your face is dripping on mine this wasn’t who you were supposed to be
it hasn’t been longer than a week but the days drag on years and pull on gods ears and beg for more time to pass but less and less goes by
never ending i feel like i’m stuck
im in an artblock
your face is gone but it was just there i must have misplaced the brush that i drew your short eyelashes with
whimpering you are but why, was it something i did?
my paint brushes are all intact and my workspace is clean
how could i have messed up
the painting with the orange sweater delicate brown eyes and thick bleach hair is dripping
off the canvas
i haven’t done much other than wait for you to dry our before i can add more on to you
but you won’t dry and you’re on top of me
my neck is wet with the saliva you won’t stop touching me
no i said i would take a break from this canvas but it’s encasing me i cannot leave
i messed up havent i
wonder why i did to deserve this
im using my fingers to put your streaky smile back in place don’t look at me like that please
i have to ask for you to leave i cannot stand the shade of orange you’re wearing being on top of me
please leave
im letting you out to dry

in the same position i can’t move
my neck is casted by guilt i must have done something wrong
looking back that couldn’t have been you
it must have been the wrong medium
your acrylic is dry and patched you couldn’t have torn me down like the thin canvas dripping with trauma filled sweat
no because you would never let yourself wear something mine while you took myself from my own body
right?
youre the boy i painted over and over in my head just to get you right
hold my hand let’s go for a walk hold me tight because the wind against my cheek causes a shiver down my spin
lift my head up to glance at the intentional light because you know i’m scared of looking down at the petrifying dark
but you burned my eyes and i am no longer mine the painting is ruined and i can’t fix it
but that’s not who i planned for you to be you would never do that because i don’t mess up the watercolor goes on thick paper while you go on premeditated canvas
was it me?
have i misread but i do not misread i am not an idiot it’s not my fault you chose to do this yet i cant not feel this in my chest
im a failed artist with a body stolen in disgust
i want my orange sweater with wrinkled sleeves back

— The End —