Polaroid pictures tacked on the wall,

Twine binding the past,

Flickers in time,

Immortalized.

Seventeen, purple dress, running towards the ocean,

Sunrise on the horizon.

A cat curled in an armchair,

Purring as its body rises and falls.

A group gathered in front of a movie poster,

Dressed all in pink,

A stranger took the photo.

These are the photos kept for the ages,

Not those in the dresser.

The creaky wooden drawers hold the suppressed,

A monument to what has not been dwelled upon,

In many moons.

Curly almond hair almost covering his eyes,

A fake smile covering his face,

The freckles I tried to forget,

My first love.

Two girls, one blonde with green ends,

The other with a short brunette bob,

We argued to no end about him,

And I left them in Philadelphia.

The things I wish to forget,

The words I can never take back,

The apologies I wish I could send,

The inadequacy I wish would leave my brain.

I don’t hold their pictures anymore,

But they still plague my mind,

A collage of every mistake I have ever made.

I put them back in the drawer,

And am reminded of the girl in the polaroids,

The one that is happier.

Not the one with the forced smile,

The jokes that weren’t funny,

But the one who has found her flock.

Who knows exactly who she is,

And who she wants to be,

And that despite it all,

Her mistakes don’t define her.

The clock chimes downstairs,

It’s a new year,

With more polaroids to line the walls.