October | 2015 | Golden Star Poetry

I’ll be getting this published in my school newspaper hopefully; the theme for submissions is “regrets”, so here you go:

I stood next to you, and you closed your eyes, waiting for a present. I gave you a kiss. I ran away.
I sat next to you, on the bus. I asked for your name. I never saw you again.
we all sat in a ficus tree, waiting for the outdoor play to start. then one of you let me down the tree on your back, secure. we saw the show and left our separate ways, back to our homes over the sea.
I rehearsed asking if I meant anything to you but you didn’t seem to understand my subtlety and said “of course”
I think I loved you but I never said that I loved you in the way that a lover tells a lover that she loves her.
I flew over your neighbors backyard and broke my ankle, I learned a lesson but became petrified of the jump.
when I went to the observatory, the planetarium shows flew at me, I was petrified of sudden loud noises and collosal explosions, the speed of mars hurdling into me
on my 14th birthday I said I was infatuated with a person that wasn’t you and when you countered that you were dating someone else it hurt.
when I saw you the last time I never said anything, i just stood and took your blessing and wished I could savor the feeling of your fingertips brushing my elbow, of your hair against my forehead, because reminding myself that you were going wasn’t going to help me any. I cried in the bathroom stall and came out like it was nothing at all.
since you were responsible for my life I wish you could have been somewhat stronger and less afraid, so I could say your name with pride; so i didn’t have to search for you in everyone.
I wish I had never cried at the end of the show, rushed to embrace his velvet doublet, to stain it with my saltwater, to hear him say oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god oh my god—