<![CDATA[HOME OF KAT'S PROJECTS - National Poetry Writing Month

<![CDATA[HOME OF KAT'S PROJECTS - National Poetry Writing Month - 2017]]>Sun, 12 Jan 2025 08:41:35 -0500Weebly<![CDATA[30. i am not in love with you]]>Sun, 30 Apr 2017 04:00:00 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/30-i-am-not-in-love-with-youi am not in love with you
the birds outside my window are car horns
that silver layer coating the desk is not dust
my feet aren't cold
not even in these shoes
that aren't falling apart at the
     soles
this paper has a fingercut
term paper was done five days ago
i slept dreamlessly last night.
when i woke up, i decided to be a pacifist with my past
   i've forgiven all the people who hurt me
it snowed in North Carolina & finals week was canceled;
so was the last day of this semester
i get to keep this corner dorm room forever, with all the silence of the late
night buses
i'm not terrified of heights, the dark, or people
who try to hug me
and i don't miss my grandpa
   or any of his songs
   especially since his body still lives at my house and his mind,
busy being elsewhere
America is the land of the free & the home of marked graves
a queer woman is President and she looks like me
no one asked her where she was really from when she moved into high office
& the White House was painted rainbow this morning
someone asked how i was doing today
and stayed to hear the truth
and most wondrous and splendidly excellent of all
i am still not in love with you

]]><![CDATA[29. dreamt of old loves]]>Sat, 29 Apr 2017 15:47:59 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/29-dreamt-of-old-lovesdreamt of old loves,
original songs,
crosses & secret languages,
fetuses in bags that i cradle and sing to,
old men chasing me—wanting to own me,
hitting the red panic button by accident, but not really
top floor of a crisis center,
climbing down a crack in the floor into a damp subway platform,
bodies are scattered all over the tracks, their untimely deaths unpeopling their skeletons
taking the strain off their tired frames
a train pulls into the station and i
think about getting onboard

i woke up and still felt
asleep
the morning can be such a nightmare

]]><![CDATA[28. there's a pretty girl in my mirror]]>Fri, 28 Apr 2017 05:37:41 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/28-theres-a-pretty-girl-in-my-mirrorthere's a pretty girl in my mirror
she has bed head
and two stray pimples
one eyebrow on fleek
the other can't decide which direction to
fly off to for the summer
mouth full and flushed with
drool and dreams
she winks, then tells me,

"how glorious it is to be alive."

]]><![CDATA[27. if i were an eraser]]>Thu, 27 Apr 2017 18:20:34 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/27-if-i-were-an-eraserif i were an eraser
i'd be lopsided with good intentions
and misguided with guilt
i'd praise the blank page
the do-evers
the rage quits
the ghost that once populated your phone with
sweet before-bed messages
i'd help you forget
or pretend to not know those gray smudges
that remind you of Billy Joel,
scraped knees,
belt buckles,
unkissed cheeks & unresolved arguments,
apologies that choked to death in your throat
alongside the corpses of the word, "no"
and the word, "yes"
and the hope that you'd learn how to let your eyes
smile again
i'd rub myself raw trying to convince you that
the safest place is nowhere
not even inside of yourself
that perfect takes giving up and looking for
an alternative way to fuck up,
repeat
that uncertainty is a way of life and
regret is a body
to embrace mistakes only as a chance to
play yourself like a game and cheat
code your way to victory
though, the only way to win is to lose to yourself too
so maybe just pause life indefinitely
maybe just restart the board
scatter the pieces
then throw them away
faster, faster, repeat, erase
i'd leave a trail of blanks behind
like a gun that won't stop firing
won't stop triggering until
i'm empty
until i've disappe

]]><![CDATA[26. i didn't feel like]]>Wed, 26 Apr 2017 20:03:24 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/26-i-didnt-feel-likei didn't feel like
writing poetry today
maybe i'll go dance

]]><![CDATA[25. my grandpa thought my grandma was his mother today]]>Tue, 25 Apr 2017 04:00:00 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/25-my-grandpa-thought-my-grandma-was-his-mother-todaymy grandpa thought my grandma was his mother today
and i wish i could tell you how my grandma used to look at him
when eating was so hard that his eyes closed as he chewed
but i can't remember

]]><![CDATA[24. it scares me to fall so fast for you]]>Mon, 24 Apr 2017 21:54:18 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/24-it-scares-me-to-fall-so-fast-for-youit scares me to fall so fast for you
you stole the scream from my lungs
my lungs have never been so breathless
breathless kisses in the lamplight disappears everything
everything i know is spinning away & i don't know when my good sense will be back
back then, i never saw you coming either
either i'd have backed from the edge or jumped sooner
sooner, i'd learn to swim or drown

]]><![CDATA[23. how is it so easy for you to]]>Mon, 24 Apr 2017 03:36:35 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/23-how-is-it-so-easy-for-you-tohow is it so easy for you to
cut me loose
set our love free
to be eaten by untamed things
at midnight by the hanging tree
i thought your eyes were windows to
your soul so when they curtained
i thought it—your soul—was asleep
when in fact it had packed its bags and
moved back into his mother's house
and when i knocked on the front door
the cardboard artifice crumbled
and revealed the empty spaces you'd left
behind
i've searched for you since so that i could return them to you
i'm sure you'd want this barrenness back

]]><![CDATA[22. friends make sure friends eat]]>Sun, 23 Apr 2017 03:07:17 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/22-friends-make-sure-friends-eatfriends make sure friends eat
ice cream when nightmares refuse
to stay in the dark

]]><![CDATA[21. hangovers aren't so bad]]>Fri, 21 Apr 2017 18:31:51 GMThttps://www.katoutofbag.com/national-poetry-writing-month---2017/21-hangovers-arent-so-badhangovers aren't so bad
i know this because they haven't stopped my friends
from drinking
i say this because i want to be drunk one day
i want to go soft in your arms
i want my hair to be everywhere
and we're both laughing
full of punch lines and mouthfuls of each other
not a single moment
wasted
only the buzz of tension from couch springs
wheezing at our stumbling tongues
we become inarticulate
but the need to stretch this night is clear
there may not be another again
who knows what the morning will bring
all that sunlight might be bright enough to burn our eyes
that see each other so honestly
the thunder of migraines might shake us awake
and dry out our mouths so that nothing comes out right
but rain will carry it all away eventually
so we risk it

]]>