[no title – first line]

My poetry is not very good lately

perhaps always

what things are

seem not what they are to me

and I have been lonely.

I wanted to be so many things

not famous but honest

and well liked.

This was when I was cared for

and my medicine was left beside my plate

for me, three pills to digest dinner in a small clay dish.

Now I keep forgetting

where I’ve hid bottles

and have surrendered

to grow immune to certain curing drugs.

There are times when I grow anxious

like when my voice

is so hoarse, it can not be heard

by my mother

and she tells me I sound sick

or when I saw a man walk by

whose face looked like Patrick’s

and I know I’ll never tell this man, that,

not audibly, not correctly

but know if I could only

find the words

maybe his face would change and smile.

These times leave

parts of me anchored in them

and as they pass

I am less

the girl I was.

Less breath

to push beyond my lungs

and tell you, tell someone

I am hopeful.

##

by Shannon Nissa Bailey Powers