Somehow I'd Forgotten All My Memories

 

Somehow, I’d forgotten

all my memories,

or was pretending to

 

like a zombie

milling about

in search

of sustenance.

 

So, after the funeral,

I ran.

 

After all the history sharing,

and others’ merry making,

I ran.

 

I tried to be nonchalant,

missing a few steps

on the way

down the stairs

and out the door.

 

It was this weird, clean

break inside me.

 

And how could I say it—

it was one I was happy for.

 

Since all my memories

weren’t roses and candy,

since more than a person had died

and my own heart

was still being stitched up

in fresh bandages,

 

I just wanted solace,

to turn up the stereo

in my car,

to drive through the mountains,

clouds breaking—

 

tossing my rings

out the window

unmarried

to the Me Too

I left behind.

 

 

© 2024 Jennifer Wagner

 

For Shay’s Word Garden Word List—Save Yourself

 

NPM Day 17

Trafficked

photo © 2013 Jennifer Wagner

she never knew a man

before this

hasn’t known a real one since

© 2013 Jennifer Wagner

“Between 700,000 and 4 million women and children will be trafficked this year, with the majority being forced to work in the sex trade. In America, there are an estimated 40,000 men, women and children enslaved at this very moment. If everyone who cares takes action, we can end slavery once and for all.” Don’t Sell Bodies.

“Typically known for coffeehouses and cloud cover, Seattle has also gained another title: 3rd most prostituted children in the nation. Experts estimate that there are up to 300,000 underage girls sexually trafficked nationally every year. These girls (many as young as 12 and 13 years old) are bought and sold for the pleasure of men all over the country.” Rape For Profit Film website.

Click the links above to learn more, raise awareness, help end this thing.

haiku my heart
Poets United: The Poetry Pantry

Notes from the Bloodwater

What you don’t know is

the wolves came when I was much too young

and sunk their teeth into the deep of me and left a hole.

The surgeries to repair the damage

have not yet gone far enough,

and so I carry this wreckage around inside

where I’ve hidden them

and stretched Kevlar over the scars.

Sometimes I strip it off

and break things in half

to produce a rough edge

and cut the stitching open again

to watch the blood flow

down the shower drain.

Sometimes I make suggestive

remarks to a near stranger

and show a little too much cleavage

while gazing intently at their mouth.

Male or female, it doesn’t matter,

it’s a heart I’m looking for,

since mine is near drained.

I have this counselor

who loves me, I think.

Or else she is just really good

at letting her eyes well up with tears

when I tell my stories.

She says to not stop wanting connection,

to not stop looking to God

for love,

to safe people, for love too.

But God, I fear, allows things

I am still struggling to understand.

And safe people, well,

most days I think it is safer

to love the oil slick street after rain.

Jesus, she once said to me,

understands being bloodless

and mangled and left with holes.

And he wasn’t even repulsed by a girl like me.

I haven’t told anyone yet

but I’m beginning to think maybe I could like a guy like that.

© 2013 Jennifer Wagner

Sugar

Street Posts, Seattle, WA.  Image © 2013 Jennifer Wagner

 

 

when your spindles turned

to char-

coal,

you wiped your eye-

lashes

and turned your hair crimson, cocoa,

blonde, black

melting in the freeze;

you, a candy in the dish,

purple and licked,

true confections on the tip

of your tongue

giving kisses

cold-

er than

they’ve draw you

in the lines

of your cheekbones

and jaw-

dropping curves

the ones

 no one keeps

past

yesterday

but still

you try to be, to do

everything they want

turning bucks

and, when honest, at your heart,

feel something

you’ve heard

is akin to love

Copyright © 2013 Jennifer Wagner