The Poetry Marathon

I decided to go back to an old chapter of my book,
One that has too many crossed-out names,
So that I could dot the I’s and cross the t’s.
Re-read the one chapter that made me who I am through,
Tear stains and constant new additions.
The one gift that never showed me happiness for long,
Managed to lose it during two months of arguments and two weeks of star signs,
Kept me awake when the whole world had gone to sleep.
Up late planning a future with you,
When I should have prepared myself for a future without you.
As I dust off the cover and open Pandora’s box,
The gift that introduced me to heartbreak.

Dear past flames,
I guess since I never blew out the last dancing flame,
Our story went on longer than it should have been.
Made itself the light at the end of the tunnel,
Neither one of us thought they would travel down.
I never thought I would write about you,
But since your flame, and your beauty was not hot enough to burn,
Burn these pages out of my mind I decided to reignite our flame.
And slowly write as it destroyed all the remnants of us.
And set fire to the home we once sheltered under.

Given I still do miss the moments we created,
But I can never enable myself to miss you.
Because you were a far cry from what we intended,
A late realization of truth,
A bouquet of thorns growing out each other’s hearts as we,
Lied to each other that we were the right people but the timing was off.
Yet there is no time where we, this, us could have worked.
Rather let me acknowledge that your love left when I said we should be friends.
I guess it was my fault for overstepping boundaries we had not created,
As we were merely acquaintances

I hope you are happy,
With an individual that cares for you and loves you the way you deserve.
You deserve the best and nothing below that.
So I apologize for not holding on to the gift you gave me,
But instead giving it back to you.
So you found someone who deserved it because I did not.

So as the flamed devour the thoughts of you,
I did think of you,
About how we could have been and how you were now.
And I remembered never to compare bedtime stories to true events

~Baker

Yes I am a believer but in this day and age, it is the hardest thing

I remember as a child,
I would know your word like the phone numbers that belonged to my parents.
Whenever I was in trouble or distraught I had you on speed dial,
But as time went on,
I guess I got tired of your voicemail,
And put the phone down and stopped calling

I remember when I grew up,
You blessed me with more ages but I repaid you by adding more distance between us.
You gave me the ability to make my own decisions,
So please tell me why you gave me this gift if you knew,
I would rarely decide to follow you.

You gave me people to talk to,
But tell me, Lord, why should I tell a man,
Who has a sinning nature, my sins?
Read the word that has been attributed to you,
But written by so many people,
Has different interpretations.
So how do I know who is right and who is wrong?
You gave me the Holy Spirit to decipher,
But why does it feel like it’s always silent?

Tell me how I keep my faith,
When the children who you called,
Reject you and believe in theories that make you a figment of our imagination.
Where is the hope in that,
When all the vessels are broken and can no longer hold anything but empty promises.

I remember when I lay in bed at night,
And wonder where you were when I fell,
Rose to the challenge and succeeded.
Questioning your love for me when all I felt was hate surrounding,
Were you ready to welcome me home when I tried to take my life?
Or would I have hung lifeless?

I will never know the answer,
But I apologize for trying to praise you and please them,
Walking in the valley of darkness,
But also trying to keep my light ablaze.
I am sorry for questioning your actions,
But my ancestors made it so I become curious and search for answers.
I hope you know I am still a believer,
So I end this note by saying,
Amen

~Baker

To find the right words, to define my state of mind and being was ideal in this marathon,
To let my existence, energy, and thoughts be felt in an artistic manner rather than the usual loud and chaotic approach I use in person.
To show people, that may be directed to this page or come to see my work the many layers that make me human,
To gain a better understanding of myself and appreciate me more,
For both the reader and myself the writer.
So if you are closed-minded and not open to an unorthodox way of thinking take time to open your mind,
As you will venture into the inner workings of my being,
Share my insanity and become connected with me as I extend my being through the words you will read.
This is different from my other work but has a feeling of relatable
So once again as you enter my mind,
I hope you enjoy

My mind has not been a haven for me for the longest,
Had the lights out and learnt that the human mind,
It can be its own horror story.
I continue to fuel the fire to my mental purgatory.
Be welcomed by Sadness,
Hook-up with Heartbreak,
And sleep with Regret.
And fight over Joy with Anger.
Repeat this cycle over and over like the playlist you play,
When someone breaks you.

My mind has not been a paradise for me,
It has been the breeding ground for doubt and a home for my demons.
Dressed as friends after I failed to throw them out,
So they agreed to let me stay since they were willing to share their home.
But every night after playing keep-away with my dreams I lose a part of myself,
I find myself lost in it every night,
When the calls are ended, the lights are off,
And my thoughts are turned on.

I wish I could find myself in my own home,
But this house I called home is anything but.
I wish I could evict all the terrors and finally return,
So I stop pitching tents in the hearts of people that are overbooked as it is,
With people that come for their hearts but stay for their souls.
So their heartstrings intertwine and their souls tie.
So I can stop wandering the lonely streets at night even though they are filled with people.
Stop spending nights on the streets with people that call them home.
Because I can never settle for someone who cannot stay in the same place for a long time.
I want peace, serenity, and consistency.

To stop having to close my eyes to see the girl of my dreams,
Imagining perfect in a place so chaotic,
Because it makes me fall for the damaged thinking my damaged nature can create a whole.
Let my eyes see the truth in reality and stop breaking itself in imagination,
And open my eyes and search for her,
So I know if dreams come true and know,
Whether my heart or mind has influenced my taste in women.

But I have taken depression out of my life equation,
But anger, sadness, and loneliness still equal mood swings,
And I still fail to control those.
They divide my lifespan,
Add on to my life’s problems,
And subtract more people from my life,
As they multiply in my mind.
I long for joy, not happiness.
Because happiness is temporary and I have to rely on people,
For people to give me my scheduled fix of happiness.

I have waged war on my demons for too long,
Tried to make them acquaintances,
But my head cannot house a halo as it grows a pair of horns.
I search for purpose as I remove my toxicity from my being,
Eradicate my flaws by accepting them,
And seeing them as perfect,
Because, I need to clear my mind and start afresh,
Clear out the old couple pictures,
Leave my aspirations.
And unlock all the doors.
I long to be free,
I long to be me.

As the ultra-violet rays caress your chocolate skin,
I find myself melting in the dilution of sunshine and caramel.
Blinded by this star that shines 152.08 million km from your face.
But still, I stand in awe as you seem to rise to the skyline,
Have the sun’s arms pick you up and have your face near its lips as,
The Sun plants its lips on your body and uses you as a reflective surface,
None of that mythological folklore,
No Edward Cullen or twilight romance.
Rather the perfect story to fit the breaking dawn arc.
As the waking that is you meet the Sun at sunrise,
As if synchronized under theatre light.
The sun rises and sets in your eyes,
And each time is as beautiful as the last.
Your sunkissed body is a diamond.
As the sun dances over our skin,
We find love in the dark,
As we soak in as much warmth as our bodies can withstand.
Illuminate our hidden truths and burn down the last of our insecurities.
The Sun is also a star,
It shines brighter than a sky turned off at midnight,
And lit up but by starlight.

Stranded and alone,
I stagger, I stumble, I fall.
I lose myself.
But still, I repeat this process.

Is it because I lack the general human ability to stand,
Or because I am trying to find the significance in standing up each time I fall.
So stranded and alone,
I pick myself up and I walk.
I stagger, I stumble, I fall.
I lose myself.

Yet still, as this lesson brings more pain than teaching,
I revise my own methods and correct myself like a child after a beating,
But still, I fail to see past my own reflection as my face kisses the wet tarmac.
But still, I stagger, I stumble, I fall.
I lose myself.

Till I stop and realize that it isn’t about getting back up,
It is about keeping focus no matter the goal.
Moving even when you are alone and do not know where to go.
So stranded and alone,
I pick myself and I walk.
I stagger, I stumble, I fall.
I will find myself.

When the music played and he listened,
When the words came to him and he wrote,
There were moments when he wanted to reach out into the darkness,
And feel a familiar stranger.
Write them a story about how he missed them and wanted them to return.

It was in these moments that he realized,
That, if he had to write for someone to see his significance,
Write so his absence would be felt,
Then that individual he was writing too was not worth it.
Because if they mattered they would be there.

He hated how he missed certain moments,
And often recreate them in his mind.
It was here that she told him and made him realize,
That he missed the moment he had created,
And not the individual he created it with

Remember the days when people used the payphone,
People used to insert money and actually pay attention to you.
Now we facetime, hangout virtually,
Share pictures but never make memories.
Call people but when we hang up we regret the time spent,
Remember the days of the payphone?
How money actually bought time and a little bit of happiness.

Remember when our hearts were stereos,
We played music from our heartstrings each time the high was low.
Created music on our own terms and wrote the lyrics to our summer jams,
And before that, we blasted symphonies from pieces of vinyl,
Killed ourselves softly and lived aloud,
Remember those days?
When a single cassette held your memories,
And pressing play took you on a journey to childhood.

Remember how obsolete black and white cameras became,
Now teenagers use filters,
To try to filter life’s problems.
Filtrate the sadness from their eyes and try focus on the lack of color.
How picture-perfect smiles once filled their lenses,
But now perfection isn’t found in the smiles,
But in the likes brought in by the phone camera.
Do you remember all these things?

Fall in love with me,
Close your eyes and let my voice guide you.
Let me show you just how blind love can be,
Become my favorite 3 AM poem,
The one I can never finish because perfection is not rushed,
And because I can never stop writing about you.

I loved you, but I never had the courage to tell you.
There was always a feeling that you would outgrow me,
As you moved on without me,
I realized no matter how much I tried to hold on,
You let go and put the idea of us away,
Somewhere between the 4-hour calls and the 4 years of silence.

I often create an entire universe that revolves off you and me,
But in this parallel universe I lose.
It turns out no matter where we are wrong seems to be the right word for us,
So as you lock away the feelings you have for me,
And I set mine free,
I finally have the courage to close a chapter of my life,
A chapter that has been opened for way too long,
And a chapter you wrote off way too early.

I guess it is true,
If you love something, let it go.
If it is truly meant for you it will return.
I let you go when all I wanted to do was hold on for dear life,
But I was always the one who came back,
Maybe because I loved you too much,
To see anyone else as right for me