The Black Unicorn, a collection of poems by Audre Lorde, consisted of numerous pieces that reflected the realities of being a black, queer woman. As a result, It inspired me to create poems of my own that I felt reflected moments in my life where I had experiences that felt heartbreaking and definite. For the longest time I let a lot of these emotions and experiences overwhelmed me. Now as I reflect, I realize that nothing ever really stays stagnant. Things might seem overwhelming and it’s easy to be consumed, but in the end you learn and you move on.
The first poem titled “Seasons”, is reminiscent of a past crush, whose face I can barely even remember now. Yet, I remember so vividly how I felt. At the time I was so deeply infatuated, only to have the rug pulled from under me when I realized it was never meant to be. This person went on to like somebody else and I kept waiting and hoping they would notice me, and choose me, but it never happened. There’s a line in the poem that goes, “And you’ve long replaced me”, a sentiment that stems from the delusions that we sometimes feed ourselves when it comes to love. The fact of the matter is, it’s normal for love to not be reciprocated, you just have to accept and move on, which always seems impossible in the moment. It’s also important to understand that while love is beautiful, it can’t “save” you. While it can help and make the process so much easier, you have to want fill in the cracks for yourself.
The second poem titled, “Gone”, is about a past friendship that broke my heart. I think it’s important to recognize that love and poems about love don’t always have to be romantic. The reality is that platonic love can leave you just as devastated as romantic love, if not even more. In “Gone”, I detail the moments I cherished with a friend I loved dearly. A person I did everything with, who knew me so well that there were times when she could guess what I was thinking with just a glance. But like everything else, it seems that it was destined to end. And though it didn’t end well, I thought it would be best to focus on the good I felt when we were together. The inside jokes, constant laughing and feelings of reassurance. I think that often times we get caught up in the bad, which is understandable. It’s so much easier to remember the bad things that you’ve experienced, but the constant focus on the bad makes you bitter and hateful. This is why I chose to focus on the moments where I felt at peace in our friendship, as opposed to the pain of the fallout.
The third poem, “Butterfly Lovers”, was created with the story of the butterfly lovers in mind. Based on a Chinese legend of two lovers, Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai, the story of the butterfly lovers is a heartbreaking tale of love and tragedy . Similar to the story of Romeo and Juliet, Shanbo and Yingtai are two lovers who fall in love but are unable to be with each other. As a result, Shanbo dies of grief and possibly a broken heart, when he realizes he’ll never be able to be with his love Yingtai. To sum it up, Yingtai throws herself into Shanbo’s grave and two butterflies emerge, believed to be reincarnations of the two lovers. I found the story to be tragic yet beautiful, so I tried to incorporate certain aspects of the legend into my poem. Though the ending is arguably bittersweet as the two lovers did end up together in the end, the aspects of the concept I chose to incorporate were a bit more negative. It’s about a love that was “doomed from the start”, a love that could be considered toxic but fills your heart so perfectly that it jades your senses. Maybe it’s a symptom of low self-esteem, a lack of self-love, but that doesn’t stop the longing. Or maybe the love itself isn’t toxic, but the outside pressures makes it impossible for the love to thrive.
All of the poems I chose to write are short and simple, but the feelings I wanted to convey in them are vast. I didn’t want my poems to be too overwhelming and long, but I wanted to effectively convey my feelings, which I feel I could accomplish through writing this reflection. Love and loss and natural occurrences that we’re bound to experience in life, but it’s important to not let it consume you. As beautiful as love can be, it can be just as devastating.