Paperweight Poetry

First I built walls out of wood But you put a match to it and on its ashes you stood  Then I built them out of stone  But you smashed it until it was only a pebble that stood alone  And then when I finally built them out of metal and my desire  I found you couldn't tear down my walls with a hammer or with fire.  -anna sluder 

How could I explain my love for you?  It's like asking why music comes from a guitar And why the sky chooses to blue My dear, it would be like trying to explain the stars.  -anna sluder 

I was there when they burned her  Welded her into fine grains of sand She always loved beaches  So I wasn't surprised when there she wished to be spread  I asked her soul as it sizzled  If it'd like to be sprinkled with the other sands  But she said no, she'd spent her whole life walked upon And she didn't want to do it again  So I rubbed her between my palms  As it fell in sheets into the sheets of the waves  And when my brother asked if that was all of her I said no as I still held a piece of her in my hand  He knew what I'd do as I cupped it in my palm Then offered some to my brother  He didn't want to, he didn't love her the same So I brought my hand to my lips and swallowed the ashes of my mother.  -anna sluder 

I breathe from the ardent flames of your soul But you ask how I breathe, when it feeds on the breath I inspire?  So perhaps I do not inhale winded oxygen instead sizzling coals I am not made of blood and veins, I am made of fire.  -anna sluder 

Are you solely a figment in my mind?  If I touch you, will you fade from my hands?  For you always stood behind Like a shadow that can't even stand  And more recently you haven't let me come near  Yet you say that it's my fault  That I don't listen, I don't know how to hear  As if I'm the reason you are so close to falling apart  And the only way to prove that you were right  That this wasn't all a strange joke  Was for you to burn to ashes so white  So when I tried to touch you, you turned to smoke.  -anna sluder 

Everyone sees the scar on the old man's face  Instead of his heart They see the eyepatch over a sunken hole And always ask to impart Everybody sees him as if he's blind  But he sees better than them all They see old men shriveled to nothing  While he sees them still in uniforms marching tall  So when he answers that he sacrificed his eye in the war No matter how young or old, people don't get the clue How his heart fought more than any of his battle swords  For he lost his eye to defend and to save me and you.  -anna sluder 

Four plates in my hand as I move around the table And then the forgotten thought begins to dawn That you and our lives together are only a fable  As I pick up your plate I set for a wife three years gone.  -anna sluder 

You promised him to stay away from me,  As if distance could heal unmade wounds,  But how could my soul ever let this be?  When I have promised myself to be as close as I can to you.  -anna sluder 

I used to fall one too many times But at least now I choose to rise  I once lived one too many lies  But at least now I don't wear my disguise.  -anna sluder 

She never understood why he'd bury himself alive for money  For him it was the power more than the ability to earn  So she dug in his wallet, papery things that were a waste of trees And held it to the iron wrought fireplace to watch it burn.  -anna sluder 

You are my stay when the storm surrounds  The ending to the tunnel when their is no light around  But you are also my sunshine on a still sunny day  And my dancing partner to the music that sways.  -anna sluder