Lauren Zuniga

I fell in love with a poet at the "When Your Strange" event at the Red Cup.  Her name is Lauren Zuniga and she is pictured below.

Personally, I don't think there is enough poetry in the world.  So here is some of her's.  Enjoy.

 things to do in an ice storm

Hold your body out for stranded passengers.

Live in laundry baskets.

Weave blankets out of past conversations

You’ll need a loom as sturdy as every lie

and thread as slick as every promise.

Cut out your flaws into intricate patterns.

Be a paper snowflake, hang yourself up,

let everyone see through you

Your flaws are much prettier than theirs.

Restock your pantry with convenience store food.

Eat the dark and the quiet, like honey buns.

Lick every drip of its shame and icing from your fingers.

Until you become The Nothing and the Nothing becomes you.

Do price checks on a generator strong enough to power

20 more years of marriage.

He says that’s all you need, 20 more years

then you can leave. A family is concrete.

You’re the one holding the wrecking ball.

Dream about warmth.

Give up being a poet so it can’t be held against you.

Laugh rollercoaster songs.

Change the pillowcases.

Do science experiments.

Sift through seven years of shallow compliments.

Forget that he’s a good man

Forget that good men are hard to find.

Forget that your mom has been married six times

and none of them were worth their weight

in imported beer, so she kept the last one

like a $2 scratch off ticket, terrified to

scratch off the last square.

Buy antique dishes on eBay.

Because you once heard your

Grandmother say that she knew that if she just had

the right set of dishes, she’d have a happy marriage.

Forget that your grandmother is old and alone now.

Read the poems of empowered women.

Stand naked in the mirror.

For the first time, really look at your body.

Covered in tree skin, your roots diving

through red dirt, trying to find warmth

Your trunk hunched,

your limbs have been reached

out for so long they are tingling and numb, coated

with slick and gleaming glass, snapping

under the weight, you can not hold everyone together.

Begin packing.

Take the bundle of dreadlocks, remnants of a man

who used to value art more than structure.

Take the pinked lined pregnancy test, a reminder

that you always know more than you think you do.

Take the two most beautiful gifts of forgiveness

you could ever offer each other

and

take

You.

Watch your reflection bend and drip to the earth.

Re-introduce yourself to the sun.