Lifelong Companions

There is a monster in my belly
There it lives and there it lies
There it breathes and there it dies
There it waxes, wanes, and whines.
There is a monster in my belly.
There it shrieks and cries and screeches
There it rips and tears and scratches
There it gnaws and claws and slashes
There is a monster in my mind
There it fled after a rut
Had been dug inside my gut
There it lingers in the shadows
There it prowls and growls and swallows
There it conquers me completely.
There it waits, beneath my bed
There it lurks, inside my head
Check behind the closet door,
Can’t you hear it as it snores?
“Dear, it’s all inside your head.”
There is a monster in my head.
It used to live inside my belly.
But it chose my brain instead.

Parallel Universe

I hear the tick-tick-tap of a lesson being written on the board of another room,
Where someone like me sits perched in her chair,
Scrawling down names,
and dates,
and a laundry list of facts,
Glancing at the clock with a sigh.
She gets bored of her routine:
She wakes up to an incessant, grating alarm every morning when the sun first stirs.
She spends an hour getting ready to present herself to people who will forget her name.
She listens to a love song and envies the singer's experiences.
She forgets if she has her own.
She walks to class and arms herself with a notebook,
Scribbling pretentious poetic verses in the margins,
and copying someone else's words in between,
and drifting off into the tick-tick-tap of someone else's life.

You look different.

You look different without glasses.
Who are you trying to impress?
Without those thick plastic frames and smudged glass lenses,
your eyes seem so thoroughly naked.
I'm afraid to take too long of a glance,
lest I trespass into your mind.
I wish you would put them back on,
because I can't see you clearly without my own,
and I can't offer you myself the way you're being offered to me.

Regrets

Maybe when we kissed,
I opened my mouth too wide,
and a layer of my heart got trapped within your jaws.
Maybe when we spoke,
I forgot to coat my words in shadows,
and I unveiled my tongue's intentions too quickly.
Maybe when I'm with you,
I let my guard down,
and maybe I regret that.
Maybe next time,
I'll sew myself shut.