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On Realizing Leaves Will Change Regardless

from Accepting the Facts by Julia Alexander

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lyrics

I still hear the rusting swing set in our backyard
creaking through the fall wind.
But I only have vague memories of the chalk drawings
on the asphalt at the house we never finished unpacking.
When I try to remember that stepping stone between real homes,
between old and new normals,
I only catch glimpses through the telescopes pointed at my mind.
Leaves changed and died that year like every other.
They cluttered our front porch giving the pain chips some company,
and they broke and crumbled into dust underfoot
as we ran to catch the bus.
We spent our afternoons chasing the sunlight on our bikes
and we hid in our bedroom every night
waiting for the alarms to stop sounding
waiting for it to all be over.
Our parents in the kitchen tried to explain to us
that they were people. Just people,
and they never knew any better than we did,
and they weren’t cut out for this.
They were never given directions
on how to fall out of love gracefully,
on how to unravel a family gently
But, we didn’t understand.
We could not comprehend how two people could
point north and teach us to run towards it,
then admit that they were wrong about the orientation of the compass.

Years later, I felt my needle break
under almost no pressure.
I dug up my own roots and let weeks grow in their place.
I let darkness consume me
as I watched people untangle themselves from my veins.
Leaves changed and died that year like every other.
I ignored my friends as they became strangers
just like I ignored piles of dead leaves in the front yard of our new house.

Last October, I watched an entire town of people
unbecome themselves in the wake of a loss
I have yet to find the words to describe.
The sterility of cold classrooms contrasted embraces
and a quiet longing to wrap myself in people
who were unraveling in my arms.
I grasped on to all the wrong people
and expected them to map everything out of me. They never did.
Leaves changed and died that year like every other.
I wondered if his passing would always loom over me.
I wondered if I would always count away from that day
like a backwards time bomb.
“1-day since destruction, 1-week since destruction, 1-month since destruction, 1-year since
destruction.”
I am still counting.
1-year since destruction
I am still counting.
1-year, 2-weeks, 3-days since destruction.
I am still counting.
I will always be counting.
I wonder if the changing of leaves will always
remind me of the way his fingers swelled around rings
and enclosed them within his skin until it rotted away.
I think about him rotting away

Leaves will change and die this year like every other.
I am still thinking about him unbecoming himself.
I still think about his body exploding into star dust.
I still can’t tell which way is north,
and I am not sure that I really need to know.
I point my compass whichever way I please,
hoping for the best.
We are still trying to weave ourselves back together.
I am still trying to orient my maps correctly.

credits

from Accepting the Facts, released November 1, 2013

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Julia Alexander Connecticut

I'm a part time poet and a full time cry baby. If you get too close to me, I'll write a really emotionally confusing poem about you. It'll be exhausting for both of us.

To contact Julia for inquires of all sorts e-mail juliaalexanderpoetry@gmail.com
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