by Reyna Biddy
A Compilation of Spoken Word Poems
Written and Performed by Reyna Biddy
to whomever this makes and spreads love to..
i love my love
Reyna Biddy
for my mother’s pain,
this is proof that sunshine comes after rain.
you are proof that beautiful things come from tragedy.
i’m so honored to be the result.
for my father’s pain,
this is proof that real love stories do exist.
you are proof that beautiful bonds are created in silence.
i’m so honored to share my mother and y(ours).
for my mother
who gave me her heart,
we will never not be on the same beat.
for my father
who gave me his soul,
we will never not feel the same things.
for my parents’ pain,
thank you.
for birthing me so brokenly beautiful.
preface: recollection
i haven’t returned to this book since i left it. it’s been an entire year. i’ve watched its growth from a distance but never had the courage to swallow my pride and revisit. each page, a reality i once knew. i’ve been too afraid to face myself. i haven’t yet made peace with all of my truths. i anxiously gave birth to this song sometime in early December, without ever even knowing the meaning of “motherhood.” foolishly, i planted seeds for a garden of healing, unaware of the process. i neglected the responsibility of watering then nurturing. as i watched the leaves fall and come again, i tried my best to sing. i tried my best to remember how the lullaby went. the one that taught you how to be a good friend.. the one that encouraged us all to love each other.. the one that forgot to mention how to love ourselves. the lullaby that never mentioned the aching. every day i’m in pain. i watched my mother die many times before i was old enough to understand what it meant to be broken from heartache. i was too afraid to ask her if her heart was still beating. i was too afraid to ask her if her heart wasn’t beating. i was too afraid of the answer. i was too afraid of being alone.. so i always just left her alone. i watched my father take the form of an earthquake. my mother sung herself into an early deathbed. afraid of the reality of leaving, and what could have been or what could never be.. she stayed. i heard all of the nights she spent wailing every time she whispered “i love yous.” and “i trust yous.” i watched my father neglect those tears. i watched as he sat in broken silence. i watched as my mother held her Spanish tongue for the sake of an avoidable argument. i watched my mother give up on her happiness because the comfort of “till death do us part” was too sweet of a chorus.
the sweetest part in her song. i lost her somewhere along the lines of “how are you?” and “are you ever okay?” i’ve had to figure out how to deal with abandonment on my own. somehow i gave birth to the ideas that my father instilled within me. i began noticing as i made a habit out of lying beside bodies that meant nothing. he always warned me to save myself. inevitably, i became the villain. there became vines on my heart from the stillness. i kept trying to sing. i kept trying to put myself back into the place where innocence left me. my mother had died before i ever even had the chance to get to know her. the real her. every day i’m trying to find the parts of her within me. i was in the midst of practicing how to make love when i created something permanent. something bigger than i, myself, could ever be. i must have mimicked these habits from my parents. i’ve always wondered if foundation was ever even a consideration as the meaning to their true intentions. i was never taught how to love magic, so i could never bring myself to appreciate everything my heart had been creating. something worth reading when you’re in need of saving. that was never even a consideration within my true intentions. i just wanted to write. i just wanted to sing my parents’ love song.. more than anything, i just wanted to get rid of all the gloom and all the melancholy. i was sure i wanted to encourage people to heal themselves.. but i never thought it’d be through my story. i never knew how many people were on the same journey as me. one year later and finally, i’m ready to water my plants and my trees. i’m ready to plant an entire nursery. i’m ready to be less like my mother.
i’m ready to be more like me.
i’m ready to be more alive.
all in all.. i really just want to say thank you. to you. for giving me the strength to share my truths and for encouraging me to continue on. i’m encouraging you to continue on.
i’m forever and ever grateful.
Always Love,
Reyna Biddy
opening interlude
i’ve found a way to speak my heart’s language.. every day. i’ve learned to see the beauty in everyone and everything because someone once told me a closed mind don’t get fed and without soul food there is no growing, so.. i taught myself how to love the parts of you that even you are uncertain about. this was written for you. i can only hope that throughout the process of reading this, i will touch you in places none of your ex lovers ever could have. i imagine that through my words you will pick up pieces of yourself that you thought you could leave behind but your wounds are what make you powerful. and your scars are what make you human. and your stretch marks well.. they sing a great melody on how much you’ve bent but love..
love would never let you fold.
i’ve mastered a way of giving the most secret parts of me publicly—yet silently. so, here i am. writing to you—writing for you. hoping that now you can see the beauty within the transparency in “brokenness” or the importance in learning yourself, finding yourself, accepting yourself and eventually.. loving yourself. i hope you feel the truths and experience the growths and appreciate how invested my heart is—in not only my love but love, in yours, too—and maybe you’ll choose to ride with me down this journey i’m taking to become a better me and my ambition to help you realize that you’re worthy.
Of Everything.
the beauty of being a writer and connecting with someone’s soul is,
no matter where the relationship leads,
the love never dies when pen meets paper.
like me
my mother loves me more than anyone,
yet i can’t seem to figure out how to love her back.
i can’t love her the way i love others.
i could maybe be afraid.
or maybe i’m ashamed
to love someone just like me.
someone unafraid to bruise.
someone who knows how it feels to constantly lose the battle.
someone unafraid to be left empty.
i’m a lot like her..
and she’s a lot like me.
my mother needs me more than anyone,
yet i can’t seem to understand how to need her back.
i can’t need her the way i need others.
i could maybe be naive
or maybe i’m too blind to see
what it looks like when
someone else’s love for you is unconditional.
someone waiting to be loved,
someone just like me.
Loving yourself is the most fulfilling and beautiful love that life has to offer.
Unfortunately, we’re all looking to love someone else..
we're all looking to be loved by someone else, first.
who i was in high school
you could call me your biggest enemy or you could call me the love of your life. but.. i promise there are no in-betweens. you could say i spoke too much or i shied away more than often. i never really wanted to be friends with t
he people whom i spilled my soul to.. and i never really showed the people most important to me the love that they deserved.. see i wasn’t the kind of person you could love every day.
mirrors & epiphanies
- sometimes i love myself in you.
like teenagers on prom night,
i have no self-control.
i love me enough to hate this body.
i’ve run for hours in search of a cure,
shedding calories, ridding all the pesticides
that live inside of me.
it couldn’t possibly be my fault.
- at 7 my mother told me i was big-boned
“like the rest of my father’s side.”
- at 14 my father said,
“maybe you shouldn’t eat that last slice..
i mean, i don’t want you to blow up overnight.”
- at 17 i wore a size 13 jeans because
i had high blood–pressured thighs.
it wasn’t until 20 that i looked in my mirror and realized
no one would ever love me for who i was on the inside.
not at this size.
not in this life.
results
the moment you said
“i don’t love you anymore”—
i decided i don’t love me anymore,
either.
pseudo
he trusts me enough to forgive my past..
and brings it up over morning coffee and midnight whiskey.
he loves me enough to look beyond my flaws..
but will never kiss me with love handles and morning breath.
he misses me enough to lie by my side..
even on nights he’s home late, with soft scents of cheap wine and rose.
he needs me enough to call me on his free time..
to ask if i’d ever leave without a warning.
he wants me enough to make sure i’m all for him..
so he reminds me,
day out and day in,
that without him
i am nothing.
10 reasons i could never leave
I found you first. You were mine before anyone wanted you. You were mine before the growth and the grooming and I’ve made you into what you are.. you don’t deserve to leave me.
Someone once told me to never make a home out of someone who doesn’t love me but.. I am a refugee and at night I need saving, and in the morning I have four-months pregnant cravings, for a love that only we make, by the afternoon I get homesick.
We said silent vows as we stared in each other’s eyes and struggled through the sand just to jump in the ocean so we could feel a wave so strong neither one of us had the strength to pull out of. You’re stuck with me.
Remember that night when we were so drunk we poured our hearts into one another as if they were so full with lust that love began to tip over. You never really could sing but your lips created a symphony.. one of the best I’ve ever heard.. that night you said you were ready. Despite all my fears of full commitment, that night I made a birth mark out of you. I pressed you against my skin, delicately yet.. you became permanent. I remember you said you needed me.
You taught me things about life and me.. that I’m not sure I’ll ever truly believe without you. Like how to love myself.. and how worthy I am. And how deep I can get before I ever let love inside of me. And how sometimes it’s okay to collapse. Sometimes it’s okay to relapse. Sometimes it’s okay to miss everything you once were and sometimes it’s okay to dip in the past.. but only if you’re ready to be the beautiful tragedy. I’m ready to be the beautiful tragedy.
Some nights I bleed over you. I write our story until I get so tired that my wrist won’t continue moving. I haven’t reached the ending.
My body has a habit of waiting up for you.
We hold hands tighter than an infant holds his mother..
I’ve memorized the melody between your every heartbeat, just so I could sing it back if you ever get lonely. I.. learned the gaps between your fingers, just in case you ever need a hand.. I made sure mine fit perfectly.
You promised we’d grow old together.
halfway close
There are parts of me that
part of you wants to love.
I’ll be patient.
rhetoric
How many times do you have to be hurt, humiliated,
thrown in the fire and burned,
embarrassed, neglected,
thrown in the ocean and forgotten,
lonely, bruised,
thrown under the bus and damaged,
broken, confused,
thrown in the mud after being used..
terrified, and stuck
till you realize that love doesn’t?
love note:
i always swore love could never tear me apart until someone loved me better than i loved myself and then decided not to stay and took it all away. took me all away. then i was forced to deal with the pain. i was forced to deal with the bruises and stains on my heart. i had to learn the reality of loving myself unconditionally.. for better or worse. through the calamity and/or happy “me.” i was forced to love all of me, entirely, regardless of all the reasons why someone else couldn’t. regardless of every flaw that i allowed to have power over me. i was forced to really see who i am. and despite how much destruction any lover has caused me, i was never meant to give up on love. i was never meant to shut people out. i was never meant to save myself from hurting—i was only ever meant to grow from it. i was only ever meant to build and create within it. i was only ever meant to make love, to spread love, and to be love. i refuse to give up on me. i refuse to give up on everything and everyone meant for me. sometimes we break.. sometimes our hearts get torn into a million pieces..
but life is about building. and loving.
and trusting that the sun will come out tomorrow.. or eventually.
to the brokenhearted who still wear bright smiles on their faces. i see you.
you and i are a lot of the same.
always strong when “always” doesn’t require us to be.
trust me, you’re perfect. you’ll always be okay.
be patient. happiness is coming soon.
i wander
some days i feel things too deep.
other days.. i wonder what it’s like to feel anything at all. sometimes i can feel the exact moment when everything in a relationship changes,
for the worst—it’s like a super power.
that moment you look inside your lover’s eyes and don’t feel love anymore. sometimes i can’t understand why it all hurts so bad.. and other times i can’t understand why it doesn’t hurt at all.
freestyles off chardonnay
one night i stared at myself in the mirror.
i asked, “who are you?”
i remember responding through my subconscious,
“i’m me.. the only person i know how to be.
i wouldn’t consider myself gorgeous..
but some days i’ve learned how to be pretty.
my body’s alright, but i could use a sit-up or.. fifty.
i wear hoodies during summer
because tight dresses are too risky.
more than often my hair is straightened..
when i was younger and it was curly
everyone would tell me i looked dirty.
i smile fairly big..
even when inside i’m really dying…
my reality sets in after dark
once i’ve questioned myself about why i’ve been lying.
i’m the type of person who’s always running.
good things come to me if i’m lucky.
it makes me feel really good when he says he love
s me..
but sometimes i cringe when he touches me.
i wonder why sometimes my mom barely hugged me
whenever she would—it was her tryna be funny.
i wanted to tell her about my new man from Kentucky,
but i know she knows he probably just wants to fuck me.
i guess i’m good at speaking because i have all these supporters
but what they don’t know is i sleep in the fucking corner.
in a one-bedroom, living with five people.
‘clustered like vintage finds from that one time,’ words from a hoarder.
if they knew i barely loved myself, would they still love me?
i’m not really sure who i am.. or who i want to be.
i’m not really sure my reflection was meant to define me.
my dreams keep me trapped because society has confined me.
every day i get told i should model,
someone who looks like me shouldn’t have a brain like mine.
but.. i promise i’m fine.
i’m just waiting on the day happiness truly finds me.”
snapping back to reality—
All these things I never realized had me hurting.
All these things I couldn’t let anyone say to me or about me.
It’s easy to pick out flaws but what about the positivity?
that night i left who i was in that mirror.
- I’ve been searching for my beauty, ever since.
love note:
you’re so much better and more beautiful than you give yourself credit for.
the word “beautiful” is too cheap a word to describe someone like you.
stop waiting on someone else to validate who you are.
you owe yourself some more recognition.
to all the boys i loved,
Forgive me for giving you
so much power over me.
