I overwrite my poems
not because they’re wrong,
but because they never feel enough.
Each line feels like a half-truth,
each word a trembling hand
reaching for something it can’t quite hold.
Like cupping water, like that one dream.
I cross out verses like old memories,
add metaphors like bandages,
Personify my tears,
polish pain until it gleams,
call it “art.”
But maybe the first draft
was the most honest,
the ink that stumbled,
the rhythm that broke,
the silence between two lines
that said everything.
Still, I overwrite my poems.
as if rewriting could save them,
as if perfection could resurrect
What was already alive.
