Posted in friendship, love, poetry

Nothing Weird About It

Nothing Weird About It   They made fun of me— that I liked punk music, drawn towards androgynous men with eyeliner and tattoos, that I never outgrew the teenage emo stage.  They called me names— derogatory jabs to bring me down, politically, socially, morally incorrect pet names, mongoloid, useless and naive.   They teamed up to abuse me— attacking my secret vulnerability, extreme ticklishness, backing me into the corner of the room, physically pinning me down, outnumbered.  They ignored my texts called me out  flipped me off berated my diet told me I was weird.   A gravitational field pulled me towards them— the sarcastic ones, friends gifting vulgarity as if “fuck you” had replaced the words “I love you.” I’d never trade any of it.   —Leanne Rebecca

There’s no magic formula to finding best friends. They manifest from unlikely places and often the people you may have felt hesitant to let into your world end up being the ones that mean the most. Once you find them though, you never let them go.

Tonight I’m feeling thankful.

–Leanne Rebecca

Posted in art, poetry, writing

Fascinated

FascinatedMy friend Becca and I like to exchange writing prompts as a way to keep in touch (she lives on the east coast and I in the Midwest) and also to encourage each other to stretch our poetic muscles a bit. The last prompt was mine, and it proved a challenge, taking me a solid two weeks to produce. We were supposed to write about the first time we’d “met,” or in this case, the first time we saw each other. The prompt also came with a catch…it had to be the truth, regardless of what kind of light it placed the other person in. It’s been 5ish years since that fateful day, and I must say, she’s just as cool now as when she captivated me from across the room in our literary method class freshman year of college.

I recognize that maybe it’s scary to exchange this type of poem with a friend, vowing to tell the truth no matter what, but I promise it’s worth it. I loved writing this piece and I can’t wait to read what Becca thought of me all those years ago.

What would your best friends say about you the first time you locked eyes?