Parker Reed

“Most of my writing is inspired by my own life, both the good and the bad. I also often use my writing to express things through poetry that I can’t express through speaking.”

Tame the Sun

She was an innocent creature born into a cold world that tried to harden her. And yet, she loved so fiercely that, despite the burn, she would tame the sun when they begged her to, insisting that it warmed her.

Moon Girl

That little girl with sunflowers for eyes so desperately wanted to be the sun.

She wished to be the center of someone else’s universe, to radiate with a fierceness

so bright it burned.

But my darling,

there is a certain beauty in being the moon.

It is easy to shine during the day, but there is special strength in reflecting other’s light on the darkest of nights.

You have the resilience to shine the brightest when the rest of the world turns a blind eye, my dear girl, so you will continue to softly glow when the remainder of the world will rest

Silver Platter

My penchant for pain has shaped so much of who I am as a woman.

The last time I experienced tranquility was when I was three years old and nestled on my mother’s chest.

I’ll be dead by the time I experience that again.

My soul will have been cut and placed on a silver platter for savage men to eat.

And it will all be for nothing since my predisposition for giving, weighs so heavily on my identity as a woman.

Maybe by that time when I see the face of serenity again they will already have found another use for my decomposing body.

A House is Not a Home

A house is not a home

A house is a bed, and a furnace, and a TV

Home is two arms and a heartbeat

A house is the shaking voice of my father and an echo of a heartbeat

Home is the veins traced on a hand and rough fingertips stringing together heartstrings

A house is my mother crying in the next room and my sisters blissful ignorance

Home is a resting place, a safe place, everything that my house could not be for me

But the home is a home is nowhere at all

I am home

My rib cage is the foundation

My heartbeat the bedroom

My mouth the door

I have cracks and leaks and dents but even as the trees come crashing down i will not fall

My mind will not collapse like a roof in a storm

Or like my father’s will to alcohol

I will not fall

I will not break

There is no place like my own skin

A house is a noun

Home is an adjective

But I,

I am a verb.

Bad Deck

I like to wave to the little girl I used to be

I don’t encourage her to enter

Because I know she doesn’t deserve the pain I carry

But I do like to let myself wonder who I could have been

Had I not been dealt such a bad deck

Would she be waving at all?

Or would she know better than to trust someone she doesn’t recognize at all?