Poem by: Bekah Turney

I try to remember what it is like to be alone.
I feel the grip of independence slip 
Through drips of drink off of my lips
And proceed to draw within.
I see myself sitting inside looking through-
Large thick paned glass window,
Lack luster with its frame, paint flaking away from the edges.
Long grass dances in sync with the
Tides of wind,
Along with my mind’s wild rhythms.
Green, slim blades, elongated,
Gently intertwining whispered words only they can hear.
My ears perk
To listen to undiscovered sound-
Intrigued by my unnatural intrusion.
This plays a harmonious song
Through the fantasy of my desire.
Thoughts boiling
Pondering how a simplistic mind can find a way
To obscure this dense reality.

But I see-
I see them caress one another
In imaginary thought,
Like gentle hands sliding hungry along a soft tender waist,
And between my legs grows warm.
To think something so beautiful in any form
Can draw the body in such ways
That gradually defile it’s beauty,
And make one’s hair stand on end.
Prickling upward like the green pointed blades of grass,
My passion rises,
Like a mallet colliding against a teetering metal plate,
And the weight inside the clambering scale rises higher,
And higher.
Climbing farther up towards that clang.
I wait, 
Suspense opening more my every pore, widening my tiny pointed ears.
Knowing they have something of true value to say.

I’m 5 years old again, 
I sit, molding the dirt beneath my bottom, 
Pulling weeds and see conversations between 
Completely different beings, 
As I imagine in kind through the illusionary window now. 
Singing their song- 
Green hedge and bulby violet petals bob. 
I sit here in current actuality, 
At a long drawn wooden bar, 
Spirits sliding into my palm. 
I feel these fizzling thoughts, 
Like the soda in my whiskey, 
That entraps my brain, 
Escaping quickly into a state of release- 
I write readily. 
Construing the words I feel deemed to say, 
And hope that they are honest. 
Alone I sit, waiting for my unintended tab to close-  
For the game on the tv to make its final pitch  
And end the game of this nights revelry.  
Because these spirits have sank in,  
To the parts of me I wish to hide,  
And showcase their existence  
Through what is real inside my mind,  
Slipping with every sip I take. 

On the balcony now. 
Words vomit onto your lap From the spillage of my tampered soda. 
I ask you, 
“What is life and what are we doing here?”- 
You say your shift hasn’t ended 
And you cannot contemplate this strand of thought- 
The only thoughts that run around my head like chickens Waiting to be fed. 
I look back through the window of my mind. 
Tall vibrant grass curls away in disgust, turning brittle yellow. 
The hand digs it’s nails into the delicate waist 
And pushes with force the other body away. 
Beauty ripped into a million ugly reasons 
To fall here off this ledge. 
Fall away dead to what reality isn’t serving.