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Again By Marisol

I'll start over again, and rebuild myself

Like I said I'm adaptable

Every evening when I'm alone with the hot asphalt right before I go to bed, and wake to my car

Bathed in yellow flowers, baptized

I ride anew

I am brand new

You're my fantasy

And I'll find you again

I'm chasing a glimpse, a trope, an archetype

But I'm a writer, a dreamer, a creatrix

I spin my tales, I dizzy myself, I rile myself up just to let myself down. I build and build and build but it always crumbles.

and now I revel in it

The disaster is grand, fantastical, dramatic, and a little funny.

I've got more up sleeve, at least a couple more.

I'm resilient and never bored.

My world is full

and when one fantasy ends I dream up another.

Somehow I have it, its coveted without anyone even realizing it.

I have hope, I have optimism, I have it in me.

It used to be behind the dam, waiting for me to take my droplets, but I've decided my flood can fill us indiscriminately.

I'll do it all over again

And I wont break

I'm resilient, I'm a dreamer.

You, you're just my fantasy I built,

And watching you crumble will be grand, disastrous, and a little funny.

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by kath__alina

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I'll Cry By Marisol

I remember my pink backpack strap breaking during morning assembly when I was in 4th grade.

With her soft face and tender expression someone's chinese grandma tied my backpack strap back onto the backpack.

I'll never forget her.

She did it all without a word.

El Salvador is further down. She taught me that sometimes all you have are frijoles, and they're all different colors. She arrived pregnant.

I translated her documents. She sought asylum.

A terrible life awaited her in El Salvador.

Her son is American, and he goes to school here now. I held him in my arms when he was born.

She came from Guatemala. Their tamales are different, but she would always offer some when she made them. Her fresh tortillas were delicious.

She was single, she was not afraid.

She came from danger too. A man who beat her but promised to be her husband. A gang waiting for her return. Her idea of fun was going to church on Sundays with her fancy high heels.

She came from Guatemala too but accompanied by a man who loved her. They escaped. Their families didn't want them together for some reason. They loved each other. I watched them grow together until eventually their family grew by one more.

She came here after her adolescence so she went straight to work. She fell in love and met a man and had a little baby boy. He would come up for homework help and to play Xbox. My brother and I taught him words in English and listened to his Spanish decorated with his mother's accent.

My mom with her siblings, made the journey to her parents. She sat in a truck filled with onions, all of them packed in. She said they bought her a burger when she arrived in the US and she hated it because of the onions in it.

My dad all alone on his journey back and forth. Who knows what he endured since he won't tell me. Just a memory of avocado smeared on a cold tortilla as he hid from helicopters in the desert. Maybe its better if he doesn't remember.

I wouldn't be here without them. It was always a struggle to get here, but they did it so lovingly. I wouldn't speak this language if she hadn't birthed me and meticulously switched between English and Spanish so I'd learn both seamlessly.

I'm thankful but I cry. I work hard but I cry. I forget why, but I still cry. Even if my life hurts my heart, I know what it means for my lineage. We leave things better than we found them.

You said to me this land is your land, and my land. You said to me with liberty and justice for all. You said to me We the People. You said we were the land of the free and the brave.

I cried because of Ceasar Chavez. I dreamed of us holding hands singing De Colores and I cried. It shouldn't be so hard to understand. I want that for us... but if they come for me to take me, I'll do what I do best. I'll cry.

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I wish I was pretty, I wish I was breathtaking

I wish I was too much for mere eyes to bare

I wish I was striking and carried myself so

I wish I was better at letting things go

I'm not thankful enough of how I was built

And I'm acting contradicting, so I'm jerking

And I'm stumbling because I'm wrong when I think too hard

So I think I should be more thankful

I guess, I wish I knew her

I wish I could dig her out

I wish I could see her so I could act

Just so

Maybe she'd be pretty and striking and breathtaking

For now I have her

Her face is cherubic with plump lips and cheeks

Her eyes are soft and shine

You might be mean but to her you're kind

In a world so rough it's nice to be soft

And my friends tell me I'm much better off

But I can't help but wish, to start on the dream-making

I wish I was pretty, I wish I was breathtaking

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Ok yeah, we've finally landed. What i really want is indeed intimacy but my favorite friends for that have either have boyfriends or established loyalty priorities where I rank too low. So, you got me, I don't want a boyfriend, I just want some love.

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Just saw a dude drinking a buzz ball at the laundromat, wish I could tell my dad he's not fucking original

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Love is in the air 🖤🗡💀

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I just want to be soft

I want to be sweet

I like the benefit of the doubt

When strangers meet

The way I don't know if you're good or bad

But I'll give you some love because it's what I have

I wish I was "chill" but I'm not I'm too warm

I "take things too serious" in a world full of scorn

I'm all too much in a world built for low maintenance

My mind builds concern for the sorriest of cases

What someone else might abandon, I roll up my sleeves for

And I add another passion knowing you think I shouldn't keep score

But it's hard not to notice

Not to very clearly see, the way people don't want community

They want individuality

And I'm so afraid of being alone

Not because I don't like me

Because I'm just that greedy

Because I like the company

But I pull back so sudden when I've come so close

Now I'm jaded and a skeptic but I'm craving for my dose

I won't let you break my heart, I won't even let you in

I love deeply with an intimacy you can't pin

And I've found it within me the abundant endless pool

And it's true there's no limit

It's actually kinda cool

I'm not sure how to use it, like most things, first I'll have fun

And it'll be great to give and think I've lost but know I've won

And that cockiness within me paints me putrid shades of green

A lime of sour verdant vibrant only few could think it sweet

So I guess life really knows what's right in the end

Because the sweet-thinking few happen to be my best friends

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Need a kind gentleman to hold my chin back up when I look away, so he can kiss me passionately

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Sometimes, if you’re lucky, there will be a tree outside your bedroom window. It is very important to romanticize this tree as much as possible.

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the most fun a girl can have is finding parallels, noticing patterns, making connections, contemplating

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oh ok

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Your Brown Eyes #121024

I know my eyes are brown

But I never thought they were beautiful

So why are yours

Why do yours look so deep and rich in the light?

Why do yours look so calm and stable in the chaos?

Coffee brown with a dash of milk

Chocolate, rich, and full of silk

Shiny and blank staring back at me

But not for too long or I can't breathe

I'm stuck, I'm entranced

And your eyes shine enhanced

Coffee brown with milk

Your eyes, chocolate, rich, silk

We look back blankly

Maybe if we stare it'll stop

Maybe if we stare we can hold on here forever.

Maybe if we stare it'll matter

It'll mean something

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Mountain out of a Molehill #111224

Maybe this is my mountain of a molehill

Maybe this is the time I finally fall

Maybe now I'll know better the mistakes I've made

Were never nought after all.

That hope it keeps nagging inside me

The benefit of the doubt, hard to shake

And even when you disappoint me

I paint you an angel not a snake

But I build it, I sit there, I watch

The peak I make taller, the scales I notch

The trees on fire picking wind off the top

And today I'll watch fire consume it

I'm empty but draining like a dead star

Beautiful and entertaining but a deep scar

I'm less and less but brighter and bigger

I keep feeling too much, I thought so, I figured

I always ask for too much

I only care about me

I'm on the floor I'm drowning

I keep the bottle I'm downing

I can't see straight come grab me

I'm out on the town with pained feet

And I'm searching for you

but you wont find me

And I think maybe I'm not ready

I think maybe I'm not ripe

Maybe all the times I thought I was

You pushed me back in spite

And you probably don't even think of me

I'm not a glimmer in your thoughts

I'm a surprise you'll never want

A hope you never thought about

A dream you constantly forget

A wish you're too scared to even wish

Oh what's wrong with me?

What's wrong with you?

Is my body all that matters in the grand scheme?

Is my body what's been blocking me from happy?

Is my mind the one that drowns me, keeps my head deep?

And I know you only like it when I'm funny

Maybe someday I'll die laughing

Big jest scene

I'm so dramatic

It's deathly

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My Brother's Namesake #110924

That's what they gave me

La pocha de San Pancho

La niña consentida

The special one, the one from America

The one who Tata loved the most

And I loved it

I sat in the Pipa and rolled the windows down

I watched the pastures and dirt rush by

I held his hand as he shifted gears

And he smiled at me in the front seat

And when his muchachita giggled

From the rocking and bumps of the village roads

He loved me

Y Marisol,

"la chica linda, sympatica y bonita"

The one you say you bought at the plaza in Michoacán

"Que su amor me vuelve loco"

The one who likes to go de paseo on Sundays

Your amor, your honey

And I'd watch, your hands black, maneuvering through the cars in the shop

Making your fix

And I'd feel like the luckiest little girl

If somehow I arrived right before the test drive

Or when we had to go far for parts and I'd feel alive

You'd wiggle in your seat and look at me

Through the rear view mirror

Waggle your eyebrows and wink at me

To see me smile back at you

Tu hija

And now I'm left outside

And I miss you but Tata won't understand

And mom has replaced you perfectly

You were the one who looked at me through that very same rear view mirror

And declared I wasn't even your hija anymore

Now he looks at me with pride

He brags about me to his family

My mom and him joke I'm his princess too

He says I'm the only daughter he has

La unica que tiene

I sing a song and no one says shut up

I see you tear up from how moved you are

I dress myself and no one laughs

You tell me I look nice, que chulada

You laugh at my jokes and tell me you're proud

You look at me amazed by how far I've come

You dance with me even though I'm not little

And make me spin

It feels like we're both catching up from something we never had

And maybe that's why it feels like you're my dad

Somehow all my life has built me to be

Someone who makes you impressed

And now I'm an adult

With no need for daddy

But now I might finally have a real dad.