Campus Wordsmiths: "Obituary for whatever it was you were"
By Marina Oliver | Feb. 10, 2014forget weak knees, forget freckles on cheeks. forget a season of flower crowns where no one was royal & nothing was really real. forget the way you couldn’t understand physics (how the sun could be such a big zero in the nothingscape July) or biology (if you never kissed his neck again would he still sweat salt like stored-up tears?) forget the soreness of knowing you’re wrong but being too sorry to say it aloud. you don’t own the rights to any of these wrecking-ball realizations these days, so forget the way you used to pretend every mirror went two ways & that someone cared enough to look through. forget the way the pew forced your tiny bird bones into an unnatural shape & the way you whistled those lies through your larynx before your mom sat you down and told you that no one needed to pretend anymore. forget the disaster bag you had packed under your bed before the morning you realized there’s no warding off the cerebral catastrophes brewing in your brainwaves. forget the limitless length of time it took you to understand that you were dying a series of tiny deaths for nothing & no one. forget absolution in the face of obvious puppet strings predetermining everybody’s every move forever. forget your boarded-up bedroom window for making it impossible to get out of bed. it’s ok to say fuck, you know, if it makes you feel prettier than pink lips ever did. forget the way the corners of your mouth contort when you’re about to cave. forget the anti-explorative notions of anchors & the way they keep you pressed to worn polyester attitudes of a city you want to quit.
