hand on my heart

hand on my heart.

i walked into some places

as a child and i never left.

hand on my stupid naive heart.

i swear on love. i swear

on the stars i kidnapped to my bedroom. i

swear on promises that

remain kept. i

swear on writing even as i fall asleep.

hand on my heart.

i wrote of my self portrait once,

the kind of poem

you don’t forget.

and i ponder it a moment

more; my poems are

self portraits of the universe.

my love is a synonym for

everything i’ve lost.

i remember my hand

in my mothers and her thumb running over

the dents in my nails

-why are you so stressed?-

i shook my head.

and a few weeks more and

i think

i will be able to cut

all of the grooves out

and have fresh nails.

hand on my heart

hand on my broken heart

hand on my repaired heart

hand on the heart i lost at 14

hand on the crooked ticking

of my naive heart,

hand on my heart.

my dear poems,

finally we are home.