About the author: Astrid Diani is a student at one of Vermont's state colleges. She is a founding member of the Pagan Teaching Circle and enjoys and does many forms of artistic expression, not only her poetry.
Contact the author: Astrid Diani

Like a hidden, recluse spider
I hide myself
Only to bring it out
To fight my fake, pathetic nature

We all change
to suit the needs of others
but when will I change
so I can say, "____ all the others"?

As an ancient, stale corpse
punches holes in her rotton, stale flesh
I diminish my spirit
to make myself fit in

I hate how you laugh
All your glistening teeth pearly in the sun
thinking I'm inadequate
Thinking I'm a joke

Well, we all change
to suit the needs of others
But now I'm changing
So I can say,"____ all the others"

I'm outa here
I'm outa here
Shut up, you won't even care
Search everywhere

---

jutting
cement
decending
clumsily
downward
Noises
echo
and
bounce
until
they
become
ghoulish
satanic
laughter
Shadows
elongate
stretch and feel
Yearning

---

7/9/97

Depressed-
I'm always on the edge
(brink)
Of Quiet Insanity
Noisless is the upheaveal
the meltdown
the
Disaster
of emotions
Flooding my heart, mind and soul
Freakish
Uncultured
Abnormal
Uncouth
No nice young lady would
have
(sexual fantisies)
or make herself cry
Tears
will
well.

---

6/7/98

Early awake
-confusion-
I think I drempt of you
Someone else's love
-property-
What are you doing?
We used to be good friends
-now?-
Could we ever
-be-
the way we used to
-be-
...and would we want to?
What are you thinking?
Deciding?
What if I'm
cursed?
What if nothing will ever work out?
Are
Curses
contaigious?

---

6/7/98

Little girl
pretty girl
confused, depressed girl
(angry girl)

Why do you yell at me?
Why do you push me
beyond
the
limits of
my quiet -angry- mind

I'm not sullen
angry
depressed
by nature

Why have you decided to
take your
frustrations and hurl the
bloody fruits
at my head?

---

7/17/98

All of you witness me
Walking towards the dust
Allowing hate to bitter your tounge
Permitting your heart to rot

I tried to reconcille
And you ignored
I have washed the taste away
All retrospection of you is amonst the sewers, in the dark

I will conquer
I will revolt
I will stand in the fire pit of shame
As the blaze of vicory kisses my thighs.

---

You are the entity of love
Goddess
I flail without air near your beauty.

---

3/17/99

Perfect teeth glistening in the day's new sun
How happy he is! We all exclaim
And perfect strangers wish, oh perfect wish
To be the one holding her hand

Laughing in unison
Happy feathers ticking their stomachs
Love light should be dancing around them
With Fate's kisses upon their creamy brows.

But life has diminished
dropped from her navel like a cloud of snow and
She knows that behind the smile,
the scream and cry of despair
is all becuase and for her.

---

It's as if a black hole
which is sweeping, engulfing my middle
creeps up from behind you
And as you carress my cheek, steals my soul.

I stare into your eyes
Weeping, smiling, trying to keep up
The front that everyone has seen me break
And I think that I should crash

Have you ever known
the pain of taking your own self and without thought
throwing it into the wasteland
of your own lies and self pity?

It's sometimes so much easier
to be a shell of your former self
that I only wish that I could, with 100% of the pain,
arch my back and pluck out my beating heart
and place it on the altar of the world.

Insanity breeds confidence in the starry place where I exist
So I'm empty
So I'm false
So dosen't anyone else understand?

---