Assignment

I was given the assignment to pick a person in my family, get 5 pictures of them and write about what was going on in those pictures. I picked my sister and this is what came out. (After each line is a new picture.)

She looks at me
Tears glazing her corneas
She’s tryna be a soldier,
Fighting a war I feel I never should have put her in
Our souls bleeding out the same rhythmetically painful heart beat
She smiles longing and heartache And her eyes are filled with the memories that we will never get a chance to make
Erased every time she blinks
She connects to me more than our other sisters or even or mother
She wants me there with her,
With them
So our little family can be whole again
But my plane...
is leaving
And I have to make it to my gate
Back to my father’s side
Back to Austin where they reside
And I’ll miss her
terribly
knowing the misery that I’m about to leave her in
On the plane
Tears escape my downcast eyelids
As I take one last look down at the city
Knowing that me and my sister will cry
together
Separately
___________________________________
I’m packing,
Collecting all evidence of my existence here
But trying to keep the proof that my sisters and my mother do hold me dear
Despite what my fathers side tells me
I’m moving
Slowly
Subconsciously trying to make the world stop moving with me
Trying to remember the feeling of Christmas
And hold true to my promise for the New Year
I’m not going to cry
I’ll be back some other time
And maybe by then I will have decided to stay
Her letter falls out of my pocket
And though it’s just paper
It seems to plummet
Heavy with pressure of the emotion chasing it
It wasn’t intended for me to read yet
Suppose to be opened safely on the
it won’t make me change my mind about staying
She says she’ll miss me
But she understands why I can’t stay
Says that there are so many things that she wishes she could say but she doesn’t know how to.
She wants me to be happy
and keep writing my poetry
Says that writing connects us and our pens will forever join us together
Says that she knows that I didn’t willingly choose to break my promise
She forgives me
And my eyes glisten with remembrance
Raining down on my sisters heart that I hold in my hands
_________________________________
We are young in this picture
I not older than half a decade
And she not older than a quarter
We’re smiling
Arms around each other in an embrace only shared between us
It is our fortress,
No harm can come to us as long as we are in each other’s arms
I will forever protect her
Carry her in my crescent moon ‘cause she is the only one that can put it on my face
Baby sister this
“I promise”
____________________________________
You haven’t opened your eyes yet
Haven’t quite adjusted to the light
But you’re still beautiful to me
But I still haven’t quite adjusted to the light either
“Mommy, why is she so bright?”
And you cry,
it’s like your face became a candle
and my question was it’s either sparking your future thoughts that I envied you
that I didn’t love you cause you didn’t look like me
Your thoughts that I loved Leslie more cause we could pass for twins
We shared the same complexion
Like she was my true sister and you,
You we just came out wrong,
But youwere wrong…I admired you
it was just from distance…
__________________________
You can draw!
And I still can’t believe the talent that lives in you
Not to mention you write too
I can’t believe you never told me
Now I feel blessed that that you have chosen to bestow me with your glory
Drawing for me
Letting me read your short stories
Wanting my poem to be seen in your
I can’t explain the look on my face
I’m so proud of you
I remember holding you…
But I never got a chance to watch you grow
There are so many things that I will never know about you…
damn how you grew...