Jill Roberts

   
shattered reflection in her mirror

one day,
my lungs will inhale flowers
like swallowing a pill
and i will hold on
tightly and
with shaking hands
you see,
there is a fine line between
dreaming and
mortality
perhaps, if we could fly
we would stop drowning.
all i’ve ever wanted is
to be wanted
motionless in a bed of roses
thorns buried in a throat of lies
perhaps i’ll make an ocean one day.
sometimes i like to pretend
that the world
is a lovely place
   

the absence of your presence beside me

you once tried to explain esoteric love to me/yesterday/i met a girl who was happy/poems on a mirror/last autumn i sat on your duvet/she always did enjoy running barefoot/question: why does the preschool smell of burnt waffles and weed/say: pointless/one chaotically beautiful human/the water is still blue today/don’t ask me how/she plays guitar the way a recently incarcerated mother hugs her child/truth: i am afraid/now the tan body has lost its kindness/i like to imagine she was forged from flames/you always did despise grey/i’m fine/more poems/more mirrors/i forget how small i am/sometimes/my car still smells like your spilled coffee and mistakes/question: why did you choose to die/answer: no/i was 10 when i learned the difference between guilt and regret/sleep well/darling/i hate when people compare you to the stars/he keeps yelling “man overboard” but no one is on the boat/i’m fine/you’re fine/i am alive and thus alone/the caged bird stopped singing for me years ago/where are you/theory: intimacy is a nightmare/i’m not sure what i would do without the color yellow/lie: i miss you/come back/maybe my biggest fear is the horizon/i just want to be wanted/you would have smiled/you’re fine/the mirror is gone now/and your barefoot feet are broken/like the glass bottle on the corner of 42nd street/space means farewell/truth: i am afraid.
  

Jill Roberts is a high school senior at the Branson School in San Francisco. Her work has appeared in Blotterature Literary Magazine.