Essence by Valerie Parente
Every heuristic that binds me to my super restricted ego goes away when I’m with you.
– Valerie Parente (8-12-17)
Tag: poem
Natural
Natural by Valerie Parente
I had no idea how much I cared
Until behaviors that I could not explain started kicking in
I started feeling without daydreaming
I started laughing without meaning
I started helping without intending
I started sacrificing without resenting
I do not force an emotion
But a natural force compels my mood
I do not intend to cry
But the tears begin to pool
I do not consciously try to think
But the sad thoughts venture through
I do not understand what is happening inside
I do not have a stance on what I cannot define
All I know is how much I care
With a new capacity I had no idea was there.
Now I realize that this feeling came from
Nature’s most beautiful miracle, called love.
– Valerie Parente (8-8-17)
Trust the Stars
Trust the Stars by Valerie Parente
What is meant to be is already unfolding
Promises we send in space and time
Keep your faith through the darkness of night
And the right pathway will be realized.
Trust the stars
They know your heart.
Destiny is your relationship with the universe
The stars reflect the dust you are made of.
Guardian angels glowing down from above
Writing constellations in a language called love.
Trust the stars
Wherever you are.
The awe that you feel in today
Is not constrained to the starry sky
Whenever you forget about your stellar guide
Remember, you are made of the same light.
Trust the stars
They got you this far.
– Valerie Parente (7-2-17)
Idu Ego
Idu Ego by Valerie Parente
I am attached to the past as a means of identity
Meanwhile I identify a germ as an attachment on me
A material representation of the past contaminating me
But if I can animate the past as a representation of me
Then why am I trying so hard to be clean?
– Valerie Parente (10-5-16)
Shy of Me
Shy of Me by Valerie Parente
“I’m shy” is not the statement it seems to be.
When I shy away from showing my personality
I masquerade myself purposely out of anxiety
so that I won’t feel disappointed by my inadequacies.
Feigning to be responsible without feeling responsibility.
It’s not about you seeing me for me and not liking what you see,
it’s about me being me before I’m sure what I mean.
Oh the horror of representing myself insufficiently!
Falling short of the ineffable me I dream.
Me being me without calculated routine
or me being me without addressing my needs.
It’s not about you judging me unfairly,
it’s about me feeling like I am incomplete.
Oh the horror of trying my best having yet to succeed
in being the most perfectly perfect version of me.
So I’ll state “I’m shy” and succumb to anxiety.
Too afraid to be imperfect, I fall shy of me.
– Valerie Parente (7-15-16)
The Gargoyle Mindset
The Gargoyle Mindset by Valerie Parente
Behold the gargoyle mindset
This is an anxiety complex
The result of an artistic process
By a paranoid architect.
A sculpture so grotesque
Created to act as a fortress
A creature against all the darkness
Featured along a flying buttress.
The gargoyle awaits upon his tier
But its purpose has begun to veer
Going from complacent to cavalier
A defense mechanism with a spear.
In the gargoyle mindset
Anxiety is placed with fret
On the outside it sits
For all to witness.
Once designed to protect
Became its own threat
A public display of stress
Notorious in all its ugliness.
Sometimes our minds equate safety with fear
And we get caught up in this superstitious idea
That to scare off the scary coming near
We have to create a scarier peer.
“A Gargoyle Named Anxiety” by Valerie Parente
– Valerie Parente (5-22-16)
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