Paradise | Teen Ink

Paradise

April 24, 2023
By Anna_Grace GOLD, New Paltz, New York
Anna_Grace GOLD, New Paltz, New York
16 articles 0 photos 0 comments

Do you think I don’t hear the whispers?

Do you think I don’t see their prying eyes?

Do you think my heart is colder than winter?

I think you’d be surprised.

Do you think I’m drowning in sorrow?

Do you think I’m the opposite of wise?

Do you think I’ll change my mind tomorrow?

I think it’s mine.

 

Paradise is a paintbrush in your hand, finishing the last stroke on the canvas.

Paradise is dreaming of wonderland, wondering if a rabbithole could be below the cliffs.

Paradise is hearing it, the whispering spirits, echoing in the walls as you slip in time, sipping a glass of wine.

Paradise is waking up alone, in a perfectly imperfect home, and realizing, “it’s all mine”


Paradise is a blazing fireplace, and a sanctuary of blankets safe from the falling snow.

Paradise is sunset dawning on your face, as spring daffodils start to grow.

Paradise is a slurried glass of sweet lemonade on a humid summer day, full of clinking ice, twinkling and crystallized.

Paradise is a cashmere sweater swimming softly on your skin, and candles filling the breeze with heady aromas of cinnamon and spice

 

Do you think I don’t have feelings?

Do you think I’ve got a heart of stone?

Do you think someone’s left me reeling?

I think I just like living alone.

Do you think I need love to save me?

Do you think I’m imprisoned in my own mind?

Do you think you might ever be wrong, just maybe?

I think it’s mine.


Paradise is a sweeping chill in the air, and coated pine trees huge as giants.

Paradise is the wind flying through your hair, as the sparrow’s songs break the morning silence.

Paradise, all in all, is the rush of a waterfall, raining down from the tallest heights.

Paradise is a forest floor of crimson leaves and your back against an oak tree, with a book you’ll read by molten amber candlelight.

 


Paradise is a loaf of homemade bread, with golden butter and ruby jam.

Paradise is a soft, silent bed, cozy, all-knowing as an ocean’s floor of sand.

Paradise is a gentle guitar, strummed by a popstar, singing country on her stage like a siren’s lullaby.

Paradise is the melodic purr of a cat curled on your lap, warming are legsbare legs cold as ice.

 

Do you think I don’t feel pain?

Do you think I don’t scream?

Don’t you think I’ve always been this way?

I think you aren’t so different to me.

Do you think I’m broken in a million pieces?

Do you think there’s someone out there I should find?

Do you really think I give a damn what he says?

I think it’s mine.


Paradise is sprinting in your best ball gown, through an ivy garden around your fortress

Paradise is bleeding when you fall down, and needing no one else to help fix it

Paradise is a silk scarf blowing in the wind, like a second skin, in a back-and-forth tango with the chimes

Paradise is an old dress with polka-dots in a perfect snapshot, of every embroidered stitch of life

So I fight, so I write, for my paradise, and all the little things in life.


The author's comments:

When growing up, I noticed that a lot of emphasis was placed on romantic relationships and when I felt as though I didn't need one, I was slightly ostracized. This poem is to say that you can be content and live your life alone, the way you wish.


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