rambling from freshmen year

My mother groans when I have built a laundry fortress

and my empire continues to expand.

I have her eyes and chin, and that ladder of optimism

she keeps in dark places. I wonder if it will ever break.

I used to make frustrating lines appear on my father’s face

when small loads of sand from my shoes appeared everywhere.

I would like to think that’s how writing is,

infinite grains of ideas, sometimes left in peculiar places, spilling out.

I like to drive to nowhere in particular,

wondering where the other boxes are traveling.

Reading their expressions through the sideways glance,

rushed, sad, nonchalant, and the occasional excitement of a horn.

Always going, going, going,

their heart the constant driver.

They say people come and go in your life,

but I don’t believe so, when I meet the same ones everywhere.

I hear people tell me that I need to take on more responsibilities,

then they laugh and tell me to enjoy not having so many.

I’m young but my excuses are narrowing with time.

I like to catch you off guard in a picture,

When the moment is just right or just wrong

and you are truly you.

I like the rain and its effect on me.

I fall down with it, blend into its chorus,

and carry it with me, even when I have left its side.

Sometimes I am clumsy in body and mind,

but my sense of humor gives me balance.

I love to see through love’s eyes.

I love to make you forget the trivial.

Every time I see that it is 11:11, I wish.

Every time I think of my future, I hope.

I know that life is full of beautiful things,

things I try to understand and make and do.

I know the fire is still burning,

and it can grow or die.

I know I am only a blink in the eye of the world-

but I hope to be a memorable bat of lash-

to those I hold dear.