You sit across from me in chemistry.

Chemistry, that’s where love happens, right?

Where you find that maybe molecular orbitals

Aren’t as boring as you thought,

And ionic and covalent

Aren’t the only ways something can bond…

Or at least that’s what you hope.

Won’t you please look up and smile at me?

I always see you working

Your face gets so intense, your mind flies away

To where I cannot reach you

I feel like a puppy following you around

bombarding you with study questions

if only to hear well reasoned answers tumble from your lips.

And I am fascinated

Because how can you stay focused on those lewis dot structures,

ligands, isomers,

sp2 and sp3, PV=nRT,

Crystal Field Theory,

And NOT... notice me?

I would love to discuss the difference of

Tetrahedral and bi-pyramidial over dinner

If only you’d be willing

You amaze me, I love to watch

as you spend your spare time

tutoring other students.

Quenching the questions

Drawing out network solids

Explaining equations, and finding X.

Formulas fall out of your mouth,

As if that’s their only purpose.

You don’t get paid

You’re not doing it for the credit

You do it because you want to

No other reason required

Chemistry is your lover

You never wish for a mistress

There is no Bathsheba to sway you to temptation

While you get As, I get Cs

You sail these choppy waters as a captain on a ship

But I am holding on to a piece of driftwood

Hoping to survive until morning

I envy your intelligence, yet that also draws me to you

Like a siren singing my deepest desires

To understand that which I have no knowledge

Why do you adore it so much

That you’d rather tutor for free

Than spend time with me?

Notice that I crimped my hair.

It pooffed out all weird

Not at all like I was expecting

But, maybe,

now that my hair took up more volume in the room

You’d have to see I’m here too

Yet I am resigned to watch you from afar

for you are never within my grasp

You are a magnet, and I am plastic

Wishing to be a piece of iron or nickel

But you will never come my way

and so I leave you,

to your Chemistry, Math,

your passions, your love

I fade away like liquid nitrogen

a puff of smoke

lingering only for a moment

before dissapearing from your sight

forever

bittersweet tang consume me

lick deep and dark

taunt my helplessness

until I’m wound

a knot of frustration

hot

riled

buzzing

my ineffectual admirations

rousing secret salivations

.

but I stop not

.

heady longing slinks

into rewarding reveries

inspiring delicate daydreams

of persuasive possibilities

I welcome delicious delirium

oh, my love unrequited

give me distance

let me yearn from afar

my addictive little drug

imaginings of you

hot

riled

buzzing

are all I need

We sat across from each other

every day at school,

but we never said hello.

Oh, I wanted to,

but you were popular.

I, just another boy in school.

In college,

in a chemistry class,

but you never looked my way,

and the chemistry

again failed.

Years breezed by,

we were neighbors.

I watched your children grow,

yet not a word passed between us.

Oh, I wanted to,

but being married,

and I single;

didn’t feel right.

More years wilted away;

now I can finally talk to you.

Can finally say,

I have loved you since third grade.

In this quiet moment,

just the two of us,

oh, it feels sad.

Rising from the ground,

I whisper goodbye.

Now, you are with angels.

8/21/2018

2:36 a.m. - 2:41 a.m.

Like neglect I’m forgotten in an instance, you don’t love me, you never did. You pushed me away with a single action, a single lie, a single misconception.

Like magnets we are on the same side both negative toward each other pushing away and away.

No longer attraction, just separation by an unknown force. You don’t love me, no you never did. I feel unwanted, unloved, betrayed but most importantly.. not enough. This isn’t love.. it never was. I’ll never be enough for you.. never.

I’ll always love you. I’m sorry.. I really am..

I like to think I understand.. but I’ll never fully will. You can stand in someone’s shoes.. doesn’t mean you’ll always fit them.

Sometimes, we try to convince ourselves

Of things that aren’t true

Because we think it’s the right thing.

And sometimes,

People fall in love with us

And we tell ourselves

We feel the same

Because we can’t bear

To see them with a broken heart

Especially if we’re the reason

They’re broken.

And then, everything falls apart

And you realize you can’t keep lying

To them and yourself

Because you really do love them,

But not the way they love you.

What do I say?

My mind is in a fog.

My eyes are puffy

from the tears that

have drenched my pillow.

My muscles ache for sleep

that will not come.

I pick up the phone

and with shaky hands

punch the numbers.

Your number.

My heart is pounding

in my ears

as I listen

to the long drawn-out,

Riiiing

Riiiing

Riiiing

In this moment

I can only wonder

where I went wrong

when I hear the recording

tell me the voicemail box is full.

So this is it.

No more messages.

I wonder where you are.

I wonder what you’re doing.

I wonder who you’re with.

I wonder if you are smiling right now

with another lover.

Or if you are like me,

alone with puffy eyes.

Self-destructive

and shattering to pieces,

begging for something to knock you out.

-Jo Resner 8/31/18

The Earth so loved Man

She gave all she had...

Her seas, land, and trees

All her fruits and seeds

Her last wind to ease

The sweat and burden

Of Man's open sores

In Her age old disease

#UnrequitedLove #Challenge

I treat people like answers to questions that should not be asked aloud

My chest rings hollow, caving in I crave anything anyone that can hold me up for just one more second

It’s really not about you

It’s desperate, pathetic how selfish I am I latch onto any shreds of kindness and wring you out bone dry wounded animal I want to feel less broken and you’re my next fix

You think I’m in love with you I wish it was that easy to lie to myself but

I just like the idea of it- doesn’t matter the face or textured hands or cracks in the voice my daydreams are a fill-in-the-blank with whoever’s closest by

If you’re going to pity me do it for the right reasons

You continue to indulge me- is it due to your spinal inadequacies or the dark satisfaction from a trainwreck and you just can’t look away

I drape myself all over you- figuratively, literally- you stand still enough that I won’t fall but have your arms ever been open

I wish I had enough pride, any pride but this is just too easy

You’d say no if you wanted me to stop you haven’t

You haven’t said yes either

Lord, you’re so passive you don’t care enough not brave enough to open your stupid mouth I hear the judgement all the same do you like me at all or do you just feel sorry enough to put up with my toxicity putrefaction

Pathetic pathetic pathetic

Do you think of me and wince

Pity is worse than hatred worse than apathy worse than disgust

Was every platitude a pretense to sustain a dying ego so fractured you manufactured each ounce of respect to avoid the splinters of fallout

Lacking personhood, denied of humanity can’t have vanity when I’m too wretched to be held accountable

I feel so sick I have to stop I promise I’ll leave you be but

You’d just pity me more

My tears are dripping on these pages;

Creating little ink cages;

These poems take up too much time;

Why do they always seem to rhyme?

No matter how much I write;

I can never get the words quite right;

I can never say what I’m trying to say;

And one day I’ll be forced to pay.

I don’t know how to say the words inside my mind;

It feels as if I’m going blind;

These poems are not enough;

I’m a torch waiting to be snuffed.

I don’t know how to say the words inside my heart;

My silence is tearing me apart;

How do I say what I’m trying to say;

Without scaring him away?

I don’t know how to say the thoughts inside my head;

When I’d rather talk to him instead;

He brings a smile to my face;

And he has his very own kind of grace.

Just like that, he’s stuck in my brain;

I only seem to cause him pain;

Now my tears are running faster;

Sticking to this page like plaster.

I open my mouth and I try to speak;

But I always give up because I’m weak;

This isn’t how it has to be;

But how do I tell him he means the world to me?

I knew her since I drew my first breath

I wanted her to know me

I loved her since I first saw her

I wanted her to love me

A hundred summers past us by

And a million winters froze beneath my wings

I looked at her in anticipation

But she did not say a thing

Bitterness seeped under my skin

Loneliness engulfed my soul

With sorrowful eyes and weary heart

“Why don’t you love me mom?” I implored

Her chilling impassive eyes pierced my spirit

Tired of my pleading voice, she furiously stood

To satisfy her unhinged twisted mind,

She smothered me for good