Mary Oliver, North Country

Mary Oliver, ‘north country’

i am aching

for a life that is impossible

filled with only the best parts

of books and movies

of green fields and blue skies

of stolen kisses and whispered secrets

i want the pretty rain and soft snow

to return home to a lover's embrace

and food on the table

i want purple clouds and silver stars,

yellow trees and golden air.

i want the world to be rose-tinted and

tinged with summer

the smell of books mixed with that of the rain

white fluffy sheets and hot chocolate

glowing hair and swollen lips

happiness and that's all.

how could you be empty and still carry the whole universe inside of you? you beat inside my ribcage like the soft throb of waves on the seashore, yet every day is a prayer to a summer of shadows we still sing under. everyone leaves an echo - darling, you’re the warmth my heart needed to survive. the more I love you, the more alive I feel. don't want you to become a chapter in my life, I want us to write this book together.

This is my favorite time in history because you’re alive right now.

death by a thousand cuts

a slight sting is all i feel

when your words fall like darts

against the piece of my soul

that i bared to you

you turn another blind eye to me

and i make another excuse for you

another brick on the wall of defense

i've built around your name

should i beg for your love?

get down on my knees

and ask you, "please?"

please love me

like i love the sky

in all its hues and shades

please accept me

with my deformed clouds

and flashes of rain

but all i get are safety pins

piercing my skin

over and over again

you hurt me in ways

i can't seem to name

we seem to be doing just fine

until we're not

and you say our end came out of nowhere

but it was death by a thousand cuts

From thoughts to paper, things get lost in translation

“Some things are hard to write about. After something happens to you, you go to write it down, and either you over dramatize it, or underplay it, exaggerate the wrong parts or ignore the important ones. At any rate, you never write it quite the way you want to.”

— Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

don’t bother them they’re reading