To the World...(A Collection of Poems)

Lorn From Love

I'm used to wearing my broken heart
open on my arm with glass sticking out,
as I watch it slowly bleed.
Love is a snake in the grass,
slick as it evades me.
They tell me I'll find someone
who understands - but look away
from the wounds that lie under my skin.
The truth they dare not tell me is
that no one wants a love as
messy as mine is.

No one wants to crush something
already barely hanging on -
but I can see in their hesitation
that I'm someone, somehow, wrong.
They comfort me uncomfortably,
to say they tried to save -
but we know well what I face:
a life of loneliness that many
mock and breathe, relieved, that
they are not forced to claim.

I lie in solitude in a bed made for two,
silently crying out to the moon
when the rest of the world sleeps
as not to disturb sweet dreams.
(I'm enough of a headache during
the light of day.
I'd rather not be so when the stars
come out to play.)

I do not miss him - he is
a memory I've accepted -
but I miss the wholeness.
I miss laying down my head
and listening to a living chest.
I miss the look someone
gives only to me
as they walk through the door
after I've spent hours waiting.

There was a time I longed
to be a sweet bride -
but now I simply long for
the long days to pass by.
I will grow old
without a permanent embrace.
I will be my family's greatest shame,
forgotten but as a bitter taste.

I try to comfort myself that
I knew love once, which many
are not graced to have -
but I truly often wish
I was left ignorant, innocent,
because my goals are now dashed.