Jay Young Gerard
Response

Regret to Desire
By Lisa Nielsen
Inspiration piece

I keep measuring beats but the song is the same

The water under the bridge is dark,‎
a brooding season of overthinking
catches me at a time when
my heart was eager to undermine me,‎
turn me to jello, ‎
carry me away to your hotel, ‎
where I would wait, ‎
each time the band rolled in

But, this face to face, ‎
a disappointing confirmation of what ‎
lingered between the lines of your late night txts;‎
those things you left out when you said your life is complicated.‎

I knew, but I was curious:‎
Was I willing to ‎
slide past regret to desire ‎
without holding a memory?‎

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Jay Young Gerard
“Contusa”
Inspiration piece

I‎ Felt Something, For A Minute
By Lisa Nielsen
Response

Me half smiling, layering out my scars like pinafores,‎
You leave your fingerprints on me. Go ahead,‎
let the world think I am being held hostage

Meandering from table to table, many shots of bourbon in
gaiety on full blast –‎
You’re here to celebrate the prize

Is this better than being a rapturous side piece?‎
Getting to mingle and nod at those appreciative glances,‎
Half smile again, let them guess

This will never be a bloodletting of my soul, it’s not that, ‎
it’s not anything so dramatic, this is a trickle down to-do, ‎
brooding though I may be, I feel safer here than the streets, ‎
with just enough adoration and resentment

Once upon a time I was an elongated grin for picture day, ‎
wearing that magenta pantsuit with the chiffon collar, ‎
I could have felt glamorous, but that wasn’t your way

Hairbrush to my face when I wouldn’t sit still,‎
still hoping that today would be different

Memory makes its grand entrance again,‎
whispering “ready or not”. ‎

I tried so hard to get you love me

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Jay Young Gerard
“Homelessness”
Inspiration piece

Not the Blight You’re Thinking of
By Lisa Nielsen
Response

i watch your grueling hunchbacked body
meandering side to side while frustrated commuters twist about to get around you

you’ve been amassing pain and bitterness as if it were your birthright
the resulting inheritance is a million electrodes
and daily spams
amalgamating into an unrelenting you

motion is crucial, even sleep is nothing more than rotating bones in a fit of despair

imagine being on guard, not like we all are with our game of emotional charades,
but truly every moment taken up with a sword
and shield

imagine that
so think before you sneer and disregard

not all of us are brave enough to wear our monsters on capes

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Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Jay Young Gerard
“ReEmergence”
Response

scenes from an italian restaurant
By Lisa Nielsen
Inspiration piece

you’ve grown smaller
from last I saw you,

he is larger than
your prize

that house you coveted
has bars

he takes up the space you once lived in

I engulf you in a jarring hug
your jutting bones bruising my flesh

i’m afraid to ask what sickness has taken all that weight
when you show us before pictures, “I was 155 pounds there”

You looked so healthy,
instead I say “you always looked good,”
as if that would encourage you to eat

i want to follow you to the bathroom
tell you you don’t have to do this,
you don’t have to go back to the table and sit
with him

his eyes, glazed, droopy, his words slurred, you’re his prize too
but the cost is not as high

i want to take your hand and feed you
i want to let you know it is not so lonely to be alone

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Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Another walk, alone
By Lisa Nielsen
Inspiration piece 

I saw a rose half buried in the sand
and it still haunts me
was this a love letter to the ocean
or a memorial for a love that drowned

all i know is that
A rose by any other name
still breaks your heart
and
some of us are not so easy to love

do these walks alone mean something?
they don’t bringing me peace, just calculations:
8,352 steps roughly 2.5 miles, roughly an hour of me wondering
when i can go back home

At one time people smiled, now, as a show of kindness
we lift up our masks to cover our faces if we pass too close.
i top this off with hello, sometimes thank you
with a hesitancy bordering on desperation, I want to ask how are you doing?
is there someone at home that loves you?

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

thoughts while twirling angel hair
By Lisa Nielsen
Response

it’s been a long time since
i’ve let anything marinate overnight
soaked in garlic, parsley, lemon
intoxicating the house

is it strange that pleasure can still exist
that pungent parmesan can erase all thought
except thoughts about cheese

i now take long walks on the beach
i appreciate the loud chatter of waves
i can no longer hear
people
they are few and far between
like some unwritten law

i smile and wave

a girl looks at me but doesn’t wave back.
she is using both hands to hang onto her father
who is walking towards the ocean

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Jay Young Gerard
“Aerial: Take No Prisoners”
Response

Reconciliation Baby
By Lisa Nielsen
Inspiration piece

A misshapen attempt at reconciliation
Brought you here
I can’t possibly tell you this, your existence
Borne of not being ready to die
Who needs that burden
Of proof that you are
Why
I ask
To persist

If you believe in such things, you
were sent down to save me from myself.

I knew nothing but self destruction:
carving my veins along the grainy sidewalk
staring up into the broken light
daring
to be saved

I can’t tell you the why
of your arrival already so tenuous
So tender
So maybe

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Jay Young Gerard
“Another Door Opens”
Inspiration piece

One Door Closes
By Lisa Nielsen
Response

Parched tobacco shreds crumble in my little fingers as I rummage through handbags, carefully translating loose change into future candy

I feel around in the dark.  I know this closet well.  The clothes layered with Chanel No. 5, the heels high, the pocketbooks bruised and cracked

The only lullaby is a man calling her name.  I will fall asleep on this leathery pile before they are done.

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

I Stood, Longing
By Lisa Nielsen
Inspiration piece

I stood on the edge
past the yellow line
and the train’s rush
daring your anger to push me.

Defeat took me back to the apartment
waiting for the blows.

What does it feel like to be nestled in,
protected?

Would I dare dream

That I could
dial the phone
and have you show up
arms wide
ready to grab my bags
and save me?

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Loneliness on a Bitter Sunday
By Lisa Nielsen
Response

I, drifted between
gravestones and angel statues,
fingering the carved wings;
my chest stretched by their fluid flutter.
I read the mourners’ devotionals,
testimonies etched to enduring love.

You, stood against a tree
smoking cigarettes,
hovering through the wide expanse
of the buried.
You were still high from brunch, where
I counted your drinks and seethed with resentment.

I’m pretending.

Again,

squashed down by knowing.
If I point out what is in front of us,
you’ll be gone.

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.