Adam (Unsheltered) | Teen Ink

Adam (Unsheltered)

October 8, 2014
By haley101 DIAMOND, Windsor, Connecticut
haley101 DIAMOND, Windsor, Connecticut
70 articles 5 photos 195 comments

Favorite Quote:
“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.”

― Mary Oliver


There are times
like this
when my blood approves
of life and I try
so irrevocably
to find something beautiful
even for a minute.

Last night the sky folded
gritty, burning sandpaper
over my eyes and forced them
to stay open
just to cry.

Sometimes
you have to feel
to discover something
real.

Last night
I peeled my clothes off my
aching body that felt so dead -
a thousand dying birds fluttered
in the empty hollow spaces
between my bones.

It was a night
that I’d cry myself to sleep
when my body finally shut down,
because it had to;
I would wake up to a
bloody sunrise
and chilled air,

The birds in my head
would scream too loud
for me to remember
how to present myself
as alive in the morning.

There are times
like this
when my blood approves
of life and I try
so irrevocably
to find something beautiful
even for a minute.

Outside (unsheltered)
the wind rips
at my emptiness,
and as the birds fall away

I see cardinals,
sitting carefully on wires,
and I smile, thinking
you’d like that.


The author's comments:

for my friend Adam


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This article has 3 comments.


on Oct. 15 2014 at 11:45 am
haley101 DIAMOND, Windsor, Connecticut
70 articles 5 photos 195 comments

Favorite Quote:
“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.”

― Mary Oliver

thank you. and I see what you're saying. perhaps I can rephrase it. 

KingFoe SILVER said...
on Oct. 13 2014 at 11:06 pm
KingFoe SILVER, Morristown, New Jersey
6 articles 0 photos 42 comments
I would wake up to a
bloody sunrise
and chilled air   That's a great line. The entire poem is great and should really be published. Though truthfully I don't really like the sixth stanza, but I can't say why. 

on Oct. 13 2014 at 12:31 pm
TrishDestiny PLATINUM, Jerantut , Pahang, Other
45 articles 2 photos 91 comments

Favorite Quote:
“When it's over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it is over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.”

This is lovely and beautifully written Haley! I love it. I love the colors you painted on it - blantant and powerful. I wont be surprised if the editors approve this to be published for real someday.