I’m sorry that I always seem to dominate the conversation with all my fears and all my tears, as if I can’t find the time to let them go at any other time. I’m sorry that it seems like you only ever get to see me when I’m like that. I’m sorry that I overcompensate and accidentally suffocate despite my best efforts not to entangle and complicate. I’m sorry that we got stuck staring at each other across a square table spewing the same words that we’ve spewed for some time now, instead of working side by side on some project either one of us could have dreamed up. I’m sorry that conversations always seem to go south and I’m not fun to talk to lately; I know that wears on you and only pushes you farther from what I say that I want. I’m sorry that I overthink all the tiniest things and calculate the damage I could do, and I’m not more free-spirited around you like I am with everyone else. I’m sorry I’m not the friend that you deserve yet and that I’m always so caught up in my own head. I’m still trying to figure out how to fix that and so much more. And I’m sorry I’m apologizing now in a series of apologies instead of just making changes in my actions, but I won’t give up because I know I can do better, and you’ll never have to see me like that again.

~A.G. 11/13/19

Shaking hands
Prove nothing.
I’m not on drugs,
I just drank green tea.

~A.G. 11/12/19

Throw a penny
Into the deepest well
You find,
And hope you know
What you’re wishing for
Before it hits the bottom.

~A.G. 11/11/19

He said that
Hurt people often
Hurt people
Even when they
Don’t mean to.

~A.G. 11/9/19

Dear Winter,

     You’ve always been my toughest season, and as I write this, I am struggling not to struggle. I went to bed last night, and I was cold. I woke up this morning, and I was cold. I stepped outside, and temperatures below freezing greeted me. From my window, I’m watching snowflakes fall, just barely visible, and even though it’s not even 3pm yet, I can tell that the sun is nearing the end of its daily journey to below the horizon.

Dear Winter,

     I didn’t always dislike you, and I’m not sure I do even now. I know last year I said I was no longer afraid of you, but when I sense you near my heart still sinks. It might have to do with the worry and hurt I’ve seen in the eyes of my friends around this time of year. It might be the gray that you’ve put in my father’s beard, from hours spent pushing snow around parking lots, instead of sleeping in and building snow forts and dragon sculptures. It might be because you just make me want to sleep; I lost so many hours on the Hilltop because I wasn’t ready to get out of bed, and the thought of a nap was all that got me through classes I wish now I had enjoyed. It’s hard to enjoy anything when there’s a snowdrift heavy in your brain.

Dear Winter,

     I know you’re only just beginning to peek around the corner, but I’ve known you were on your way since I first felt you in August. I know you just want to play, but you’ve hurt me without meaning to. I’m trying to forgive you even though it’s not your fault.

Dear Winter,

     I want to love you, you must understand; I think someday I will.

~A.G. 11/8/19

I’m tired.
Of walking on eggshells.
Of having no motivation.

Of faking smiles.
Of talking too much.
Of hurting others.
Of not being good enough.
Of being hurt.
Of trying too hard.
Of feeling I should try harder.
Of this back and forth.
Of being upset with myself.
Of this weight that threatens to crush me.
Of needing a break.
Of not doing anything.
I am tired.
I was not meant
To play this game.

~A.G. 11/7/19

Ones and zeros,
Roll the dice,
Morse code transmissions,
Particles inhaled improperly,
Computer glows,
Perhaps pay a price,
Deceptive admissions,
All count to infinity,
Hidden when smaller,
Change the notation,
53 4f 53 2c
4d 6f 72 70 68 20 6d 65
49 6e 74 6f 20 61 20 67 68 6f  73 74
50 6c 6561 73 65 2c
41 6e 64 20 64 6f 6e 27 74
4d 61 6b 65 20 6d 65
49 6e 74 6f 20 61 20 63 6f 70 79 2e
49 27 6d 20 67 6c 69 74 63 68 69 6e 67 20 6f 75 74 2e

~A.G. 11/6/19

“The best muse is
A moving target.”

Scattered thoughts,
Hurried steps,
There’s a method
In this madness;
It just needs
To be found.
What is wanted,
Already known;
What is needed,
Almost done;
Targets are
Somewhat fleeting.

~A.G. 11/5/19

The brightest stars
In the sky
Don’t make those
Hidden between
Any less magnificent.

~A.G. 11/4/19

The cost of one more
Hour of sleep,
Is every last leaf,
And 4:30PM darkness.

~A.G. 11/3/19

They replaced the picnic table
With a maintenance building.
As easily as we left our mark
On this place,
It is fading away,
Not by will but by force.

~A.G. 11/2/19

22 years is a long time,
And this is far from the
Worst winter I’ve had,
But I’ve ¾ of a life to go,
(It feels like immortality)
And I don’t want to feel
The cold alone.
That mountain log cabin
Burned to the ground
Long ago,
And I have yet to decide
If it’s wrong to drink soup
From a metal water bottle.
(It feels like immorality.)
“Love, you must always love,
I will never let you live
In a world where not loving
Is an option.
You must love.”
I’m trying, I swear,
But love is confusing
And there’s many different kinds.
Will pragma only ever
Inhibit agape?
Does ludus conflict
With philia?
Is eros necessary to
Know what love is?
There’s too much to consider.
(It feels like my achilles heel.)
I’m capable of loves,
I still don’t know which,
But it seems the cure to winter
Only ever makes it colder for me.
If you checked your phone
And called me sometimes,
Maybe it’d be just a little bit
Warmer and brighter,
Than previous winters.

~A.G. 11/1/19

I’m not scared to die,
Just scared of dying,
Take me painless,
Take me fast,
But don’t take me yet;
I’m not ready.
So Mister Reaper
Tell Saint Peter to
Tell God I’ll take
A rain check.
(Please).

~A.G. 10/30/19

Home

Heart on my sleeve,
Head in the clouds,
My soul wherever you are, right now.
Please forgive me.
Please, don’t hold it
Against or over me.

My body in Watertown,
Weekends in
Plymouth or Manchester,
I feel I have no base,
And each place is like a rug,
Being pulled out from under me.
Where is home?

“Home is a person, not a place,”
She said she had two homes.
I haven’t been home in a long time.
I think about it sometimes,
(When you still loved me,
And I was folded in your arms);
Take me home?
When I was safe as a chipmunk
Curled up in a ball,
When I was happy as a swallow
Soaring up in the air.

Now I’m a garter snake,
Always trying to escape myself,
Casting off skin,
Again and again,
Trying.
Casting off this jewelry,
Casting out these words…
Casting a line,
Until it tangles overhead,
And knots form.

Like the knots in my stomach,
When he used me.
Like the knots in my stomach,
When you left me.
Like the knots in my stomach,
For months afterwards,
All summer long.
Casting off 14 pounds,
In 2 months.
A garter snake.

Reduced to a skeleton.
I’ve been building myself
Again,
Systematically,
Methodically,
Who am I?
But there’s something
I cannot build inside me,
Or beside me.

Heart on my sleeve,
Head in the clouds,
My soul wherever you are, right now.
Please forgive me.
Please, don’t hold it
Against or over me.

~A.G. 10/15/19

“Religion is a fickle thing,” he tells me, with a lazy smile, as if we weren’t both stubborn believers. Not quite in the way our backgrounds would suggest or had hoped, but believers nonetheless.

There’s been trauma from religion,
There’s been strength from faith.
The enforced hasn’t benefited,
Only inhibited growth
To something more.
Something more than
Has always been,
The elusive “someday”
Of today’s ambitions.
Setbacks and ambitions both
Barely voiced over a whisper
To an almost empty room.

But God has been seen,
Held up before wandering eye
In celebration of the Sacrament,
In the laughter of companionship,
In the tear-stained faces,
Under tree canopy and open sky.

God has been seen in
Poetry stanza and
Song lyric,
Long nights under
Star-studded sky and
Various colored fairy lights.

“You’ve always been able to hold on to your faith and your beliefs, while also listening to good music, enjoying concerts, and just generally being a cool person. I really admire you for that, and this jacket is a symbol of that.”

~A.G. 8/12/19

I’m sitting in the corner, on a bench on our back porch, alternating between reading chapters of a book and scrolling through Twitter. The book is 383 pages long and about as thick as both of my oddly shaped thumbs placed side by side. I’m on page 345, and it’s only taken me 3 hours total of reading time to get there. I’ll probably finish it after dinner.

I’m wearing denim shorts, a periwinkle blue pocket T-shirt, and black crew socks. There’s a small but prominent bruise on my left knee, all green and purple, and I can’t recall how I got it. It looks worse than it feels (which is to say, it feels like nothing at all but looks like everything).

I can see the street from my perch, and the traffic going by. My neighbor to the left has been brushing a wooden board with a stiff brush. Why, I don’t know, but it’s taken her about 30 minutes so far. Behind me is our yard, if you can call it that, about 5 yards wide and 25 long. A rabbit nibbles the grass, its’ back legs hunched up and ready to spring at any moment. I can smell pasta and sauce from somewhere nearby. The direction is undetermined.

Every once in a while I’ll put down both phone and book and just look at the sky. It’s blue today, with lots of thick, white clouds shaded by a light slate color. Despite the slight breeze, the clouds don’t seem to be moving much.

These are all the things I know in this moment, have noticed passively without giving much thought until I began to type it out. It’s amazing how much one can notice without really paying attention. Yet I’m all too aware of the passing moments.

There’s something more, as I look at those clouds. A nagging feeling deep in my chest, and if I give it much thought, it will feel like too much. But as I look up I can’t help but wonder: does everyone always feel this way, even when happy? Does everyone always feel this pain of sad without a reason for it? And does everyone always feel this lonely?

~A.G. 8/5/19

I’ve never needed anyone,
And I’m not about
To start with you.
I’m used to walking
Streets alone,
Middles of streets alone,
But it’d sure be nice
To have you there,
To hold your hand
And know you are near.
Don’t you remember?
I haven’t forgotten.
On top of the world,
Building empires together,
The stars above twisting
In their endless cycle;
I’m learning to feel
That kind of alive again.
I’ve never needed anyone,
And I’m not about
To start with you,
But I can’t lie
To myself,
To anyone
Except for you;
I miss you.
But I’m not
Waiting around
For you.

~A.G. 6/8/19

Yes, I’ll be your poster girl,
(For never saying what I mean,)
With radiant smile,
(Kept never far from reach,)
With ready laughter,
(Given a few moments,)
With easy banter,
(An acquired skill,)
And the right expression.
(A justified mask,)
I’ll be your poster girl,
(If you want to play,)
In a world never messy.
(A calculated game.)

~A.G. 11/30/19

Dusted finger tips lead
To carefully analyzed
Brain cell modules,
Buried deep within
Work-drawer cereal
And chipped-paint swathes.
Dry wall fires never lead
To poorly lit
Basement rug threads,
Mixed direct within
Flashback-driven emotions
And dread-encasing memories.

~A.G. 11/29/19

How dare you.
How dare you
Take what I’ve
Told you,
Take my struggles,
And try to subvert it,
To say it’s just
Because I’m not
With you.
My anxieties
Are not caused
By being apart
From my family,
And I don’t
Come home
Every weekend
Because I “need to”
For me.
Don’t project
Your feelings
Onto me.
I’m not
“Putting on a brave face”,
When I walk
Out your
Front door.
I promise,
I feel better
Anywhere else.

~A.G. 11/28/19

Restlessness.
What else could this feeling be described as?
The feeling that there’s more
To being alive than slogging through
The bills and loans and gas-station fill ups.
Making money just to spend it
On remaining a functioning
Member of society;
A product with the blessing
Of a bachelor’s degree.

~A.G. 11/27/19

Sword and serpent,
Stylus and sparrow,
None are stronger
Than the other
When swords don’t spill ink,
When pens
Don’t slay enemy.
Still serpents
Can’t fly above,
And sparrows
Can’t slither under.
Each has its own purpose,
To be used when
Discerned to be proper.

~A.G. 11/26/19

The warmness of fairy lights,
And temptation of Moose Munch.
Sitting cross-legged on the floor,
(Mechanically tearing out pages from a hymnal).
To love so much is a strength,
To love so much is an Achilles heel.

The world outside continues to rush,
Thoughts continue to cycle with no rest.
Time feels suspended at the moment,
(But the stack of torn pages grows).
To love so much is rejuvenation,
To love so much is exhaustion.

Something is gnawing down hard,
Somewhere within these unquiet bones.
A sense of urgency painstakingly released,
(A sixteenth of a hymnal instead of any other).
To love so much is commanded,
To love so much is condemned,
(Robotically tearing out pages).

~A.G. 11/25/19

“Important: Do you think humans are better at creating or destroying?”

“It’s a binary thing? Either we create or destroy? Creating def. If humans are made in the image of God, then they create innately. Destruction is the byproduct.”

“Well, obviously we have a tremendous amount of power and are capable of both. But I’ve been trying to figure out what human beings are most inclined to do. You raise valid points.”

“In art you have to destroy to create. That’s what I was taught by this one old teacher named Churchill Davenport (kickass name). That just meant that even if you like some precious little brushstrokes you did, you’re probably gonna have to paint over it, so don’t get too attached. And while we’re at it, we might as well rip it into 4 pieces and collage it. It might look better…I destroy and create so evenly I never finish anything.”

~A.G. 11/24/19

It isn’t liquor,
He reminds himself,
The remainder of a blunt
Passed on to another,
But the high only
Drags him further down.
He’s done this once before,
He can do this again,
He hates this crutch
He fooled himself into.
Good riddance to
Inebriation, Andy.

~A.G. 11/23/19

He lost his best friend,
All five stages of grief
And then some seemed
To sucker punch him
At once.
But now he’s feeling
Each one by turn.
He knows he got lucky,
That could have been him,
But how could this death
Be any part of a plan?
He’s aware he’s too
Steeped in this loss
To be aware of those
Around him still,
But he can’t quite
Pull himself out of this,
And reach for them.
This is grief, Andy.

~A.G. 11/22/19

Sitting on the night dark
Front steps of AA,
He reflects on
What brought him here.
Drinking career
Starting at 13,
Need to escape
Showed him
The bottom of
A bottle
Way too many times.
He wants change;
He wasn’t ready,
Last time.
Sick of
Oblivion, Andy.

~A.G. 11/21/19

The ushers still
Call him by nickname;
He’s a familiar face now
And she’s gotta know more.
Cocoa cup conversation
Reveals his past
And his predicament.
He is searching,
But not quite sure
What for.
This pothole sucks but
Keeps him safe from
The traffic overhead.
If he moves,
He’s sure to be knocked
Further down,
Amongst the
Disappointment,
Guilt,
Anxiety,
Depression,
And fear.
He asks why not more.

~A.G. 11/20/19

An instantaneous mist gathers
At a glance through glass door.
In dim artificial candlelight
A vulnerable figure kneels.
Conversing deeply yet silently
With evident devotion.
The moment feels too intimate
To witness from carpet-rooted stance.
This lobby is too close
And too far at once.
A role-model servant
Exuding authentic but gentle masculinity.
The feeling of choking and peace
Is caused by this stolen sight.

~A.G. 11/19/19

Muffin wrappers lit on fire
Iced tea bottles in pieces,
The enigma of a person’s change,
A source of constant frustration.

There’s much I don’t like about myself,
There’s much I’ve fought to change.
Progress has been made
Just as much as hasn’t.

The inconvenience of a self-preservation
That activates traits most hated,
Tests progress thought to be made,
And limits the challenge of identity.

It seems change is a result of pain,
Whatever form that be,
But certain traits remain inherent,
A default that will stay.

You can discern the response
But can’t help the initial reaction,
Redirection of recourse,
But not the source of clash.

So yes I’ve changed
And I’m still changing,
But recognize the things that bother you,
Torment me far more.

Struggles with the self
Are rarely pleasant,
Reminiscent of the implications
Of knife fights with God.

~A.G. 11/18/19

Casseroles,
All over,
Green bean,
Pineapple,
Sweet potato,
And noodle.
Silt-murky rivers,
Reddish clay ground,
Work your own land
And help out your
Neighbors.
Chainsaws, axes,
And ride-on mowers.
A handgun on every
Bed-side table,
And a shotgun on the
Mantle,
Let the dogs go,
They know their way home.
Aberdeen, Mississippi.

~A.G. 11/17/19

500 track,
Massive 2 floor
Convention center.
Abstract art Torch
And chipmunk squirrel
Crossbreeds
In parks spaced between
Towering buildings and
The longest city streets.
Indianapolis, Indiana.

~A.G. 11/16/19

Personality bigger than her,
She’s not afraid to speak
Love and Truth.
She works hard,
Laughs hard,
Plays hard.
A goofball
And a listener,
A Tumblr girl
And a writer.
Protective,
Loyal,
Compassionate,
My best friend.
And I’m lucky
To know her.

~A.G. 11/15/19

Using chalk
Sparingly
And wearing the
World’s Cutest Shoes
(Ever).
I’ve been told
Humans weren’t
Built to be
Mountain Goats
Or bats,
But that won’t
Stop me
From trying.

~A.G. 11/14/19