My Story Poem by Amy Archibald

Today
in an alternate universe
my house burned down
and politicians lied about power and means
In this world we all exists only in spirit and assumptions are made only of fact and the pure intelligence of the residents of this planet
Words spelled backwards are translated like expected
and everyone knows only what they need to
people cry when they are happy
and vertical stripes make shapes not visible to the human eye
Emotions are seen only in color and people speak one language, the language of sense and silence
Cross-eyed children run in circles before they see time
Flowers grow on sidewalks
Clouds make swirls in the sky and leaves scatter the ground in times of terror
We watch the sky for good omens
Dreams are religion to those of no faith
faithless is faith for hopeless people
Early artifacts are dug up and shape the world around them
'the past is the key to the future' the old women say
but the youth find their own way
at the end of their life they speak the lessons they learn
'we learn the same lessons' the old women say 'forget what you know and you will know what you forget, the harder you try the more sense will be lost, we all learn the same lessons for we all strive for the same goals'
but these are not the lessons
Doors are decorations and when we leave we don’t return
Secrets are kept in crates at the foot of the bed
Promises are ties to trustworthy friends with blue pinkies and headaches
We learned to lie and learned to sleep for months at a time
waking only to watch the bugs fly
If you jump to high you will become part of the atmosphere
every piece of their being was part of the houses they grew up in
Houses fall and students move out, the world grows stupid, and names are spoken for the last time
We skip over cracks in the road
and stomp on graveyards to feel connected to people we will never understand
Sleepy boys and girls run for miles in their heads as they look out the car window
And in the morning the smoke fills the eyes of young girls
When good things happen we expect something bad to come shortly and when it did we changed are names and got on boats
They come to new lands and start a life with plans
and dreams
but life is only still when you are dead
Mistakes can’t be made when things are still
people are mourned but the smart girl saw it for what it was
What are we but funny thoughts
In a town in the world in the city of the life in the country thoughts weep from the ideas of a bigger life that exists in theory only
Believe me when I say I believe in time
the right time
the right moment
late only while the world is spinning
They call her sweet
and condescending
She knows too much too
but she is forgetting fast
He lived one million years ago
before her time
his stories were written in the sand
and broke down under foot prints of those with no regards
Some can hear his stories
Where are we
where ceilings are painted
and songs are charted on a dartboard in the basement
You were wrong
You were happy
Its nearly Autumn
the sky has morbid ideas just like we do
Two stories are written in one
three four
Life without the struggle craves something horrible
and a return to a time they are nostalgic for
because consequences didn’t exist
and neither did they
Tell me a story the night of Halloween
and I can dress as myself
Don’t forget them
the way they laugh
the look on their face when their face is blank
No beautiful words on a page can open someone’s eyes to meaning
Living life to live is a pitiful existence
but living life to die is nothing.