Hope
Until now I'd lost all hope. It had been four days since I had stormed out of the house. We were fighting over who would get the car in the morning. It had been eighty-seven hours you had found me walking along the side of the road. You begged for me to get in the car and I ran into the woods. It had been 5186 minutes since I was swallowed by this sink hole.
When I fell, I sprained my ankle. I called out for you, but you never came. No matter how much I screamed and cried, no one returned my pleas. At every snap of a twig or tussle of the underbrush from the scampering of some animal, my eyes shot upward, but your face never appeared in my portal to the sky.
I tried to climb out but the sides were soft. My fingers cut through the soil wet from the recent rains and cut on the roots and stones. It crumbled in my hands and I plummeted back down. My hands burn with infection. No matter how often I tried, all I accomplished was to make myself bleed and to make my walls scale back on themselves. My escape had become impossible.
I became exhausted. I began to drift in and out of sleep in my stupor. Time began to loose all meaning. I dreamed about sleeping, and daydreamed about being awake. The only thing that kept me grounded was the alarm you had put on my watch. An alarm I had never figured out how to disengaged. It was all I had. It connected me to you and to the world above. It beeps now. It will beep six more times. I had learned to live for that sound. It pulled me back. In that moment, I knew I was awake. I knew I was here and I knew it was true.
When it first began to rain, I thanked the heavens. It had was in the middle of the night on my second day. I was so thirsty. I cupped my hands and drank from them. It was mixed with blood and mud, but I couldn't have been more thankful. But it never stopped. It kept coming and coming. It got harder and soon the winds and thunder came. The water is now at my thigh. and I am so cold. I am numb. I cannot lie down anymore. The last time I sat down to sleep I dreamed of the sea and woke gagging on the water. I dare not try it again.
The storm is getting worse. I look up and see a root, large and strong, overhanging my hole. Until I'd lost all hope, but there it was. My salvation. I mustered all of my strength and began my climb again. I dug my hands into the ground and made my assent. I closed my eyes and worked from memory. I could feel the land curling back. I opened my eyes and saw the the root. I reached out for it. It was just beyond my grasp. I grazed it with my fingers and felt myself sliding down the well.
I threw myself at the root. One last desperate chance. The wood struck my palm and bounced away. I flailed my other hand and the fleeing root. I wrapped my arm around it and pulled it against my body. I came to a jolt and clung desperately. My body flailed like a rag-doll around the root. There was a loud crack. It mirrored the thunder all around, but it wasn't the thunder. It was the root.
I fell back down and splashed into the mud pit. The root whipped back and smashed into my face. I became disoriented and slumped back into the wall. My vision became doubled and I grew more tired. At least I wasn't cold anymore. I was warm, pleasantly so. Maybe I would dream of you. In the end, hope was just a four letter word.
I won’t
Until now I’d lost all hope
But now I won't
every morning when I wake up
I wonder
would you be proud of me?
it really doesn’t matter though, does it?
because despite how much I wonder
deep inside I know
you never will be
the first month of college
I thought I was rid of you
but every day reminded me that
I wasn’t
I cringe when people are loud,
because I just hear your voice
I shrink away when people get close,
because all I see is you stepping forward
and my instincts are telling me to hide
I don’t drink
not after I saw what it did to you
I don’t sleep alone
because every time I do
I keep watching the door
hoping you don’t come in
but the part the hurts me the most
is how much he loves me
and how much of you I see in him
but I won’t let you hurt me anymore
Until now I’d lost all hope; yet, I felt as though I had more to offer. My extracurricular activities had to be more impactful; and this was my way of passing some of me, onto them. Beginning my senior year of high school, I began to volunteer with the MY BASE (Motivated Youth Believing in all Self-Empowerment) Youth Civic Engagement Program. Participants in MY BASE work on multiple service projects that serve to address the concerns of youth in Central Brooklyn. Given the difficulties I faced coming out as a homosexual, I proposed the need to provide for a greater number of safe spaces for youth who identify with such a community. Minority queer youth especially, face increased stigmatization due to anti-queer discrimination from heterosexual individuals and racism within the queer community. I thus, decided to plan a service project to increase the awareness of such an acute problem. The erasure, and lack thereof, of a presence of sexual minorities within predominantly African American societies, tends to be one of little importance; and such individuals have the right to have their voices and opinions heard. Ultimately, I would like to explore the ways in which race and gender identity coalesce to disproportionately affect queer people of color. More so than achieving a benchmark of “success” upon completion of my service project however, I hoped my service project would serve to make my Bedford-Stuyvesant community more conscious- conscious of the importance of intersectional approaches when wishing to understand discrimination; more conscious that much research has to be done on the plights of minority queer individuals; more conscious that individuals experience the world through the lens of a totality of their identities.
“Goodnight darlin”
Until now I’d lost all hope,
And then you were there
in your tall, handsome jeans
and cowboy boots,
I watched you walk
knowing that I already loved you,
I saw your face and you mine,
Your voice low, steady, perfect,
Lips parted to kiss mine
warm hands lifting my face like a flower
turned to the sun,
And butterflies flew wildly against
their cage of ribs in my chest,
I saw the story of new life
behind the darkness of my eyelids,
One of you and I from beginning
to the tenderness of old age,
“Goodnight darlin” you said
our lips parting hours later,
My eyes opened
and I knew
you loved me too
Timeless
Until now, I'd lost all hope...
Just existing, between yesterday and tomorrow...
Always caged, in numbers that keep changing...
Add and subtract time,
'til it makes sense on a calendar;
all the while,
missing the big picture...
Ask me how, I'd found some hope...
In the moments, timeless and without numbers...
Priceless, in a home my heart keeps finding...
-M.E.
201601212321
Sonnet Searing
Until now I'd lost all hope in reason
Blankets of disaster tighten the rope
Swift is the pain, happiness is treason
The darkest valleys have the smoothest slope
Something steals time, I find myself shortchanged
Within the trade minutes steal miles unseen
I see that fate surely became deranged
Leaving me to know that I'm still unclean
Darkness becomes ideal from depths below
Twisting twirling compensating the lie
Hope in more than myself lets loose the crow
Winged beast hungry for souls will not comply
Although fallen heroes cancel decay
I find strength in being risen from pain
Awaken
Until now
I'd lost all hope
With mournful words
Sadness echoed
Light was drained
My blackened soul
Anchored deeply
Consciousness wept
Guilt overwhelming
Forgiveness waxed
Until now
I’d lost all faith
A two foot casket
Named Pandora
Cloaked in layers
Suffocated by soot
Her pink spirit stifled
Asleep in the darkness
Gasping for air
A white dove escaped
Until now
I’d lost all desire
A lonesome swallow
Perches alone
Lyrical memories
Carried by ghosts
Limbo is humbling
Freedom deceives
Away she flew
Until now
I was asleep.
The sea and me
Until now I'd lost all hope. All it took was a sliver of light. A faint crack in the universe whispering all of its magical Incantations. promising better times on the horizon. For the last three months I've been thru it all. I had no glide in my stride, no dip in my hip. Dragging my dick in the dirt, covered in shit and wondering the bowels of humanity became my daily parade. I was a magnet for all the vile and senseless actions of the masses. I was land locked. I was caged. But not now, oh no, I have risen. I have cast off the muck, jettisoned my pain and left all pessimism behind to drown in my wake.
For I am at sea again. I am home. Nothing but endless stretches of smiles surround me as I drift along the big salty pond . I keep company with the stars and the wind now. There is a resounding truth in the way the sea speaks to me. There is an honesty that is not bridled by labored promises. I have found hope again. Hope at long last.
In the end, I found myself
Until now I'd lost all hope
I felt my limbs flail and give way
To things I believed were out of my control
My heartbeats pounded in unison
With the veins writhing in my temples
Thoughts muddled, I dragged myself forward
A swarm of bees captivated my fuzzy brain
Nothing was clear, blurred lines marred my consciousness
Those were days I questioned
Whether I was a mere form of existence
Rushing through life because I had to,
Carrying myself forward just for the sake of people
Alive and breathing, but far from living
For without hope, my future was as bleak
As my tormented present
Confidence hid beneath shadows
Of disappointment and denial
Slowly sucking my spirit,
A black-hole tugging at my sanity
Depriving me of the satisfaction
Of believing in myself, my abilities
Self doubt mirrored truths -
False reflections of lies I forged -
Lies I believed, more than I did in myself
For I was the key instrument
In the tragic melody of my failures
That held me in it's vice-grip
Refusing to let go, dragging me further
Into an abyss of questions
I needed answers to
But received none,
For the only person who could
Was the one staring back at me
With empty eyes,
Every morning from a hazy mirror.
Until now, I'd lost all hope
Time took it's course,
I pushed myself to forget
All that was
And began to look forward to
All that could be
A fresh start, a new identity
One that stayed true to
My best virtues
Yet, shunned my destructive insecurities
A deep breath, a clean slate
Belief in all that I'd stopped believing in
I strove to become better
To go back to becoming the person I once was
The person I longed to meet again
A pinch of self confidence can go a long way
Is one of the hardest lessons I've ever learnt
Until now I'd lost all hope,
But somehow in the end,
I found it
And vowed never to let go
I regained control of my mind
Clarity reigns over my senses
The girl staring back at me from the mirror
Has a smile plastered on her face,
The sunlight dances on her wandering eyes
And finally, it feels like she never left
For she found herself
The moment she found what she had lost
Hope.