The Stranger Within by D'Jara Culpepper (i like reading txt) 📕

how we once frolicked

through just-thawed

grasses, imagining we were

skipping between hills amid

ice-capped mounts.

I remember your chestnut eyes

upon me, calling to me.

The sunset gently engulfed us,

had your eyes smoldering.

I couldn’t look back then.

I needed to let it out,

yet I spoke not,

just looked away.

Do you remember that day?

Do you remember yesterday,

When I told you how

I lived through you?

I dreamt that night

myself on a gurney, dying;

I guess the universe takes

care of liars in its own way...

I remember yesterday:

I thought of that day

and wanted to let it out,

failing again; You asked me

if I was all right,

those angel eyes on me;

I couldn’t speak,

I let a smile tell you I was.

I want to write it for you,

but is it worth it

if it’d make you forget

today?

I’ve been told this

but I cannot agree. You see,

one has innocence, the other can kill.

Neither one can replace the other,

fill the void that it fills.

Love fuels a rickety sedan trudging uphill,

giving sights of fields with blossomed clovers

and golden sunsets rouging at the horizon.

Then, the fuel burns out suddenly,

sending the sedan tumbling.

Adoration is a child: You can

play and have fun with it,

teach it new things,

learn from it,

defile it.

I love you is crimson writing on the white waiver bill

tightly gripped in the fists of a diver plummeting

through midday clouds, crumpled at the name.

I once found adoration mangled and bleeding out

over my windowsill. Love was there crying, but

through its smirk, covered in the remains.

I remember how Love looked to me then,

as if I had murdered its innocence,

though I, too, had a hole in me.

The Lost But Unforgotten

I remember early childhood:

small hands spattering paint

everywhere, ruining walls

and carpets; dreams bright

and splendid, created from

winter’s serene silence

and summer’s spunky vitality,

from the sounds of snowflakes

settling on dying gardens

and bubbly giggling that came about

when the cool pool water splashed

our bare faces. It wasn’t so long ago.

Those dreams now gather dust.

Sharp tongues, duty, and time

hid them away. The memory fades,

yet as I watch silken faces gain creases

and feel anxieties lie on my shoulders

as dew lies upon grassy hills,

I see it all too clearly,

I dream of it like love lost.

I am of a neighborhood where blue uniforms

come running only if the streets and tenants

are blanketed with the stench of marijuana,

thick and opaque smoke coating

the sickly pink flesh of throats.

I am from Alexander Street,

from a street just off of Pontiac,

from meth labs turned to homes,

from where outsiders only see red,

from a true diamond in the rough.

I am of a strict diet consisting of

frosted animal crackers and boxed cherry juice,

of “you’ll spoil your appetite if you eat like that,”

of cracking voices in singsong at bus stops

waiting for my great big yellow to pull round.

I am from long Sundays,

from real-life stories that read

as common adaptations from Grimm,

from risking my own freedom and sanity

and modern life for a don’t-give-a-damn populace.

I am of the most bitter of norths,

where snow makes up most of the population

and flamethrowers adorn vehicles

like new-car-scent air fresheners. I am of

the lands of lengthy locks and booming blast beats.

I look out over snowcapped asphalt,

snow dashing by, vanishing as it lands,

and I realize the people where I am from

refuse meeting the people from the lands

that I am of now.

An Imitation of James Franco’s Directing Herbert White Poem Collection

I was behaving the best I could,

Trying hard not to gallop about

The classroom. I was eight and two months.

Me and the other two dozen menaces

Were loud enough to mask the phone’s ringing.

Miss Bull answered it,

Her voice still sickly sweet and plastic

From the math lesson that morning.

The longer the call went on,

The softer her voice became.

Her sister, Mrs. Striker, was a teacher, too.

I’m sure she was better at it

Since she had children of her own.

I couldn’t help but stare:

I heard the twinge of a pained mother

Accenting Miss Bull’s every word.

She glanced at me a moment;

Eyes of mediocre baby blue became sapphires

Drowned in deep ocean waters.

Even the porcelain smile she would wear

When she’d say math is fun was gone.

I thought it was news from her husband,

Even something about her nephew maybe,

Yet her eyes shifted from the window

To me, window to me, then nothing.

The intercom called my sister and me then.

I knew no good news was coming.

Everything felt good:

Mother bought us vanilla ice cream cones

Even though it was early February.

Her and father had always worried

About going hungry and bills,

Yet she bought us bracelets.

It was so good; it was too good.

Mother’s lips shot out the words like a gun,

Turning my sister into a mercy kill

While hitting me in the side:

Grandma’s gone.

Why did it hurt, that word, gone?

Was it that last conversation

About strawberry ice cream?

That my mother messed up the flavor?

Ice cream never mattered before…

When would she be back?

Would she be back?

I climbed the stairs to my room

Like any other day, bare feet

Speckled just like hers.

There was nothing else to do;

I cried for her to return,

But I knew she wouldn’t.

I ate strawberry ice cream

Yesterday and cried.

The flavor’s taste felt familiar,

But she was a stranger.

Editing: D'Jara Culpepper
Publication Date: 02-16-2020

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