I opened my notebook and began to observe the squiggles that fall down the page.
Long lines of frantic scrawls written in early hours of the morn.
Those whispers of poems and song lyrics.
Only hit by inspiration when I should be sleeping.
The endless drawl of half-baked thoughts and all-consuming emotions.
The diary of a teenage girl rests upon the first few pages,
Setting scenes of love lives that spread thick like treacle,
Words like sprinkled sugar falling into a damp cup,
Only to leave a sodden mess at the bottom.
I saw the sadness within the pages.
Reflecting a stranger talking in riddles,
And finding comfort in her own four walls.
Her smile has faltered but she still scribbles upon the ceiling.
Sometimes, they flow from her pen and kiss the paper.
As the words spin into a trance of love and hate,
And madness and pain.
They twirl in the tune of daffodils and dance like woodland creatures.
They spin to the melody of marching bands and strawberry shortcake.
I saw the shattered friendships,
Like popsicles dropped onto the kitchen floor
And water balloons thrown on scorched garden paths.
Days of fun turned venomous with quick anger and swift tongue.
The sickly strawberry vines of our egos.
As fading words tumble into the blotches of the pages,
Thick marker scraping the surface like needles permeating the skin.
I see the frustration all washed down by the gentle reminder of childhood innocence,
The loud glug of homemade lemonade,
A soundless moment caught by the clinking of ice against the glass.
Turned bitter by choking on one rogue pip.
I watched the trees turn from budding life to that sepia tone of autumn,
Observing the leaves cascade, twirling into great piles,
which line the earth with the ghostly echoes of fleeting summer.
Whilst vast growing daisy chains crawl across dogeared pages.
And loose drawings of hearts and stars masked the sentences.
Woven randomly throughout like funfetti in vanilla cake.
Indulgent, thick, divine icing.
Sweet like the summer days that hang in the air,
But plague you with stomach-ache and permanently sticky fingers.
Until the sun has disappeared, and the night has arrived.
I finger the pages, flicking them from young to old.
From stories to words, mumbles to scribbles,
Of Dilemmas, lovers, and feuds.
How a book of mayhem can make me.
How a world of chasing words can become me.
An infinity of divine, radiating, luscious words, they spill from me.
I read the magic in every page,
A secret incentive behind each character, a mission for all to overcome.
I see the stories to live, to love, to indulge in and to wallow in.
Each page stained with the flecks of personality,
Splatters of raw and blotches of humanity, a whirlpool of raging individuality.
I find the many infinite personalities that define me, who are me.
Close the book and pat the cover.
And for the last time, I observe the past, present and the future.
Realising I hold everything that becomes me.
© Kayleigh Long, 2021
About the Author: This poem was written by Kayleigh Long. She studies English Language and Creative Writing at Brighton University. The piece ‘The infinite stories that became me,’ was inspired by reflecting upon the past to define who you are today. It promotes hopeful feeling for the future and inspires people to view themselves in a positive way. We should not let the past ruin our future, but we should learn and observe from it.