Madelyn Olson

the trees are losing their leaves and I
am losing the will to clean my apartment
cause at 5pm the day says it’s done
and i’m ‘one with nature’
when it tells me I can
eat dinner in a bed that hasn’t
been made in a week,
sheets still tangled with
yesterday’s crumbs and all the shit
I wish I did when I had daylight
but it’s okay, I say,
the bears are probably doing
something, like, super similar
right now and I bet they don’t even
hate themselves

and then I cancel plans
for no good reason and I’m not sure if it’s
self-care or sabotage,
seasonal depression or restoration,
my body’s hibernation saying exaltation
is having nowhere to be
but here
after all, the bears are doing it,
the trees are doing it,
the leaves sprawled across the concrete
are, too –
do you really think they have the energy for
that dive bar on the east side
tonight?

I’m no different than a bear
or only slightly
only sometimes
we’re both mammals
with assholes and a
keen desire to rest
for six to seven months straight
with hairy legs and day-old coffee,
a looming shadow and dirty laundry
but the world still expects
all the same shit from me –
what about the bears, huh?
where was this energy when the bears decided to
call it a day for an entire season?
why don’t they need a reason?

seems you might be picking and choosing
and the bears won this time but
how can sinking be losing
when it feels so good,
and when the earth says to do it,
and when the sky feels lower and the
food tastes warmer and the dishes
keep stacking in the sink?
just you wait, come next spring,
i’ll be swinging from the trees,
sprouting new baby leaves,
drinking iced dirty chais
and daydreaming
you’ll see, I can be
so much
better

1) go to yoga once or twice a week again
2) actually eat the produce you pay to get hand-delivered to your door
3) make smoothies with it 4) i don’t know. just stop letting it rot.

5) commit to a hobby or volunteer work 6) or both if you can swing it but lets not get crazy
7) judge less. i know you say it’s because you’re a creative type, or whatever, but we both know it’s not just innocent observation.
8) you think some mean shit 9) just cus you don’t say it out loud doesn’t make it not mean

10) finish reading more books
11) make it your personal practice to write every day
12) even when you don’t wanna 13) maybe even especially then

14) stop being so afraid to learn new things. it’s your ‘talented and gifted’ complex, we know,
but it’s not an excuse 15) you don’t have to be good the 1st time or even the 20th time

16) still try, though 17) still grow

18) eat less dairy and bread if you can and 19) if you can’t, don’t be hard on yourself
20) focus more on art from a business perspective. put in the effort. you want to make this
a career someday, act like it.
21) move out of town. you love it here but you might be outgrowing it.
22) take probiotics 23) make mushroom tea 24) don’t settle for toxic relationships just to have the space filled

25) emptiness welcomes fullness and 26) endings welcome beginnings and in that vein…

27) stop holding onto things for their sentimental value. a few things is fine.
28) find a therapist 29) come to terms with death 30) leave the country again 31) go for more walks
32) get a dog. you’ll walk more.

33) tune your eyes to see opportunity in things not going as planned
34) microwave less dinners 35) buy less beauty products
36) stop convincing yourself that you will be a better version of you if you just buy this one last beauty product
37) it’s a sham

38) moisturize and stop picking at your skin
39) express soft sappy love when it begs to be expressed. you don’t have to play tough and cool.
you are rarely apathetic or disinterested so stop pretending to be.

40) pick a topic or two to learn more about and buy some books about it 41) budget better
42) spend less time on your phone and more time actively loving on pets
43) be nice even when the world seems pretty mean
44) come up with some affirmations and affirm yourself 45) forgive yourself

46) forgive everyone else even though in your stubborn heart you don’t feel like
anyone who has wronged you deserves it. they might not but do it for you.

47) surround yourself with beauty
48) unplug when you need to
49) don’t let the world make you cold
50) i mean it. don’t do it.

when i confronted my mom,
demanding the truth,
she told it.

i ran to my room, tears soaking my face
as if i hadn’t approached her,
determined to know it.

i felt so deceived!
clinging to the remnants of things i believed
to be true (that way children do)

“the cookies, too? you guys ate them?”
she solemnly nodded. my innocence
withered, rotted.

then she said
‘we can pretend you never knew!’
and i agreed (i liked to be deceived by
make-believe things…
and still do).

1) go to yoga once or twice a week again
2) actually eat the produce you pay to get hand-delivered to your door
3) make smoothies with it 4) i don’t know. just stop letting it rot.

5) commit to a hobby or volunteer work 6) or both if you can swing it but lets not get crazy
7) judge less. i know you say it’s because you’re a creative type, or whatever, but we both know it’s not just innocent observation.
8) you think some mean shit 9) just cus you don’t say it out loud doesn’t make it not mean

10) finish reading more books
11) make it your personal practice to write every day
12) even when you don’t wanna 13) maybe even especially then

14) stop being so afraid to learn new things. it’s your ‘talented and gifted’ complex, we know,
but it’s not an excuse 15) you don’t have to be good the 1st time or even the 20th time

16) still try, though 17) still grow

18) eat less dairy and bread if you can and 19) if you can’t, don’t be hard on yourself
20) focus more on art from a business perspective. put in the effort. you want to make this
a career someday, act like it.
21) move out of town. you love it here but you might be outgrowing it.
22) take probiotics 23) make mushroom tea 24) don’t settle for toxic relationships just to have the space filled

25) emptiness welcomes fullness and 26) endings welcome beginnings and in that vein…

27) stop holding onto things for their sentimental value. a few things is fine.
28) find a therapist 29) come to terms with death 30) leave the country again 31) go for more walks
32) get a dog. you’ll walk more.

33) tune your eyes to see opportunity in things not going as planned
34) microwave less dinners 35) buy less beauty products
36) stop convincing yourself that you will be a better version of you if you just buy this one last beauty product
37) it’s a sham

38) moisturize and stop picking at your skin
39) express soft sappy love when it begs to be expressed. you don’t have to play tough and cool.
you are rarely apathetic or disinterested so stop pretending to be.

40) pick a topic or two to learn more about and buy some books about it 41) budget better
42) spend less time on your phone and more time actively loving on pets
43) be nice even when the world seems pretty mean
44) come up with some affirmations and affirm yourself 45) forgive yourself

46) forgive everyone else even though in your stubborn heart you don’t feel like
anyone who has wronged you deserves it. they might not but do it for you.

47) surround yourself with beauty
48) unplug when you need to
49) don’t let the world make you cold
50) i mean it. don’t do it.

Tonight, my roommates and I will drink eggnog – spiked with rum and
whiskey – and we will put up our Christmas tree.

All day I’ve been trying to remember where my childhood ornaments are.

My mother gave them to me in an old lunch box some years ago.
I misplaced them someplace between here and there
But they’re somewhere.
I know that they’re somewhere.

I can’t stop trying to figure it out.

In that same way,
I cling to the memories,
Something in my heart always aches about the holidays.

But tonight, my roommates and I will drink eggnog – spiked with rum
and whiskey – and we will put up our Christmas tree.

I’ve never been able to handle lifes’ changes like a well-adjusted adult,
But I put on a good front.
Most of the time.

I ache – tender, in the way that I ache – for moments in time,
Things the way they were, not are.
A gross cycle because I wind up berating myself
For always clinging to that which no longer exists.

My family and I – some other Christmas – putting up our Christmas tree.

The holidays remind me of the moments
I used to exist in but never reflected on because
I was too young to understand the aches and pains of nostalgia.
Still, I bet I don’t know the least of it.

So tonight, my roommates and I will drink eggnog – spiked with rum and
whiskey – and we will put up our Christmas tree.

I will try to be present.
I will likely forget.

In that same way, I’ll exist on, drift further,
Misplacing memories somewhere between then
And now,
But they’re somewhere,
And I don’t know if I will ever stop trying to figure it out.

But I do know, I like drinking eggnog – spiked with rum and whiskey