Tag: lifestyle

garden(‘butterfly’ + ‘moth’)

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

I think of butterflies the way I think of flowers. Delicate, colorful, beauty unyeilding. Unfading. Paper thin and fragile, the flicker of wings a small miracle on a rough and painful world.

I love the butterfly with the weary eyes. The butterfly with the tiger stripes. The butterfly that looks like an oriental fan. The butterfly that is all black, with pink and red, my favorite colors.

We tend to agree that things like flowers and butterflies are beautiful. Though all have different colors, patterns, shapes, they are beautiful. We don’t always agree that people are beautiful, though all have different colors. Patterns. Shapes.

The flowers that come in mounds of blue, or pink. The tiny petaled flowers that form bunches the size of a fist. The dainy white with the striking aroma; the perky and cheery cactus flowers.

I don’t love many outside myself, and I don’t find myself beautiful. I’m a different color. Pattern. Shape. I am paper thin and fragile. I am delicate. I am not unyeilding. I am a miracle in this rough and painful world.

I don’t love you….

I won’t love you….

I am afraid to love you. You are a different color, pattern, shape. You are perhaps a moth with a massive wing span, weary in color and hard to find. You don’t strike me with the fear of you withering, of your wings being weighed down by the rain.

You are not delicate. You are unyielding. You are a survivor in this rough and painful world.

Together, we are still paper thin, but stronger than separate pages. You love light and I love flowers. You crave the sun, I crave luring fragrance. I float around through life. The wind coaxes me, owns me. You stand, sturdy, unyielding.

I flutter from flower to flower. When does it end for me? When all of the petals fade? When the current pulls me in? When I catch a ride on the wrong lily pad?

Perhaps we’ll let the flutter of the wings of a butterfly decide for both of us.

Stay

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

Push me down, lead me round, throw me away

I beg you stay

Lead me on, treat me wrong, unfair play

I plead you stay

Hold me close, want me most, hands on my yearning spine

Yet decline to be mine every day….

I dream you stay

Hold me down, let me drown in your eyes; hazel lies

Every breath wonderless, truthfulness still null, yet…

Stay, come what may.

Stay.

Flower Massacre

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

A field of flowers, a plague wrought upon by my insecure thoughts:

Does he love me, or does he not?

I scatter the petals into the wind; they falter, unable to answer my question

A daisy chain is broken with ruthless pain as my fingers commit a massacre

He loves me not, or does he? Why don’t the full blooms answer?

They say a lady should never sleep with a stranger

But his arms felt like freedom to my entangled heart

The blood-thirsty lips of the devil have a taste for foolish girls

And their foolish desires which wholly satiate liars and their sick lusts

Are they any less savage than those of us who lay waste to a field of roses?

Licking the blood the thorns draw from our fingers

The pain of bleeding is far more satisfying than that of a broken heart, constantly wounded and dense in scar tissue

He loves me, he loves me not.

My Name

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

I don’t need you to call my name to summon me from the depths of hell

In blue-black flames I listlessly dwell, wide awake just for the sake of staying warm.

Remember, December is never far away, and yet it’s been ages since I’ve seen the languid drift of snow

It melted away with all I used to know of your voice, your escape, your sordid show.

I don’t need you to call my name to douse the flames of hell

I’ve come to know them very well, more than your deceitful, demonic spell.

The dark place where you dragged my soul is only a curse if I make it so

I’ve come to peace with death and darkness, with hate and pain and years alone.

Instead, I watch in the glimmering lights as my shadow pirouettes across the floor

Light as a feather, dead as the earth, joyous as the sun, lovely as the moon

Glowing with the fierceness of the sun at noon, I delight in that I won’t hear your voice call

My heart became a rainbow after an endless tear fall

My name is not for your lips; it is for my final and joyous withdrawal.

I Believe

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

More than any other color, I believe in blue

The widest outstretched arms I’ve ever seen above and below the moon

In bright pastel or tempest grey, she always builds a day anew

With hope of sun or fear of pouring rain, my prayers may still come true

If I were to pick a religion, I believe it would be you

You, the watcher who hides away and watches from a brighter view

The invisible smile of a stranger that I picture in my dreams

I ponder on how you’ll never know how much your unseen smile means to me

More than any time, I believe in midnight

The one second on the clock that an erroneous day is blown away

A flitter of hope in a shivering heart beat leaps awake

Ready to make right this fresh new day

Yes, I believe in this the way I believe in virgin snow

That quietly covers our footsteps and holds our secret close

She wistfully shifts around our frozen trails

And slows the time just enough for us to observe the small details

I suppose it’s hard to not believe in God;

Who else can I find to blame the hardships of life on?

Or where do my prayers go after they fall as weary tears?

What idol can I rely on to placate all of my fears?

But no one can reply to all of the questions, all of the demands

They fall back into the frail fingers of my tired hands

So I believe in magic, the magic that makes up time

Who meticulously grooms the sea and the sky

Patiently healing wounds and removing the iron ball and chain

So the hope in my heart can finally fly.

Messages You Will Never Read

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

I’m only sometimes sober when I write you messages you’ll never read;

Silly thoughts and forbidden words that bring me solace you’ll never see

I hide away from terrifying truths for fear of what you’ll think of me

I lie to you, and to myself too – the truth is such an ugly thing

I wear a mask of several layers, just in case you can see through

I wander round earth’s many corners just to stay away from you

And still I circumnavigate the globe to watch you from afar

I’ve known you only in concept; I have no idea who you are

Like religion, I see you only how I would need you to be

But you’re more of a demon than an angel in reality

But that doesn’t discourage me from heathen thoughts or sorcery

I’m closer to hell than heaven, and all you’ve done is encourage me

But not enough, not quite enough to send these messages you’ll never read.

Repetition

~ Lauren Nicole ~ 2 Comments

 

A young and silly child, my mother asked me to wash the dishes

I stood on the ladder and scrubbed them clean, toweled them dry and placed them away

She ran her finger along the brim of a glass, her eagle eyes not dismissive

Without sparing me a glance she said “Do it again. Do again until you get it right.”

I traced my letters carefully and tried to get them in the lines

But I was always rather clumsy, I could never get my words upright

My father was there with his critical stare as he couldn’t make out the words

So he said ‘Do it again. Do it again until you get it right.”

When I got older, I began to run – from many things, if I’m honest

And I was somewhat fast, a bit impressive if I refrain from being modest

But my coach would never cheer when he watched me dive through the finish line

He’d just say “Do it again. Do it again until you get it right.”

I never was one to strive for perfection, I truly appreciated the arts

I painted, I wrote and I loved to sketch – the passion burned brightly in my heart

I’d stay up for hours, for days even, painting in low light

Until the instructor critiqued me, said to “Do it again. Do it again until you get it right”.

When I was somewhere between a girl and a woman,

I somehow found my way on the fight for freedom

In combat boots and camouflage, I had never felt quite so lost

A man with a red ribbon across his chest watched me doing push ups all night

I always found myself crying on the floor after pushing with all of my might

And every day, he’d seek me out and make sure he saw my eyes filled with fright

And every day he’d tell me to “Do it again. Do it again until you get it right.”

Years later, I found myself working a job, a standard nine-to-five

I never imagined I’d be in an office filling out invoices in my life

But I was awful with numbers, and someone’s paycheck wouldn’t be  quite right

Until my manager told me to “Do it again. Do it again until you get it right.”

It wasn’t the place for me, and I meandered from place to place

But there was one thing that I could never escape

No matter where I went, I would make a mistake

And I’d be forced to correct it no matter how late

Yes, I hid away and I ran from my flaws

I avoided the mirror, I ignored the missed calls

How could I live in a world where I’m so imperfect?

Who could possibly accept me when I constantly fall?

But although people lie, mirrors don’t, and I can’t deny my face

I’m only human, and I’m not one of the few who keep a constant pace

I face my worst foe, my critical reflection and how she glowers in the light

And I don’t flinch the slightest bit when she says “Do it again until you get it right”.

Just a Bunch of Words or Phrases in no Particular Order.

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

Precious silver succumbs to rust and crumbles to dust

In the palm of my hand, I remember what it used to be and I miss your touch

Life stages change over incremental ages

The awkward sprouting of a tree on the face of a mountainside

Lost and humbled, my strong façade has crumbled

I never knew that I needed you this much

Excuses and silly reasons, lies and treason

Back and forth within our own minds all of the time

I speak for myself, and for everyone else

Who has ever had drunken words occupy a sober mind

Can you empathize? Sympathize?

Anything to seem more kind?

I think of you, I dream of you

I hate you and I miss you at the same time

I wonder who really holds my heart?

The thought of being loved, I know

But the moment you embody hope

You become the one I need to hold

Nicotine and liquor make long nights go by quicker

And my patience that had run so thin can run a tad bit thicker

My weakness is my weakness for glimmering eyes and seductive smiles

And for a glimpse at a lustful gaze, I’d travel for many miles

But I won’t malinger on my pen, I’ve exhausted malformed sentences

I had no reason to write this, but I suppose if I was sober

I’d say the same thing in less words –

And also, in less honesty.

 

My Best Dress

~ Lauren Nicole ~ Leave a comment

Is jet black, velvet and to the floor

Your eyes ache for a little more

My silhouette saves you from a bore

My neck and hem decorated with lace

For one like you who loves a chase

But your eyes are drawn right to my face

My eyes, my smirk, my mocking

Only exacerbate your craze

It was no mistake.