Come Clean by Blaire Miller Bommer

Come Clean

by Blaire Miller Bommer

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You came clean this week
looked me in the forehead and said,
"I don't get it,
you're too pretty to write poetry."

So I'm going to come clean,
Since obviously you have a different opinion on this than me.

I feel pretty like the feeling the photographers must of had
when they realized they were the only ones in the room when Elvis and Nixon shook hands.

I feel pretty like the feeling the first person must have had who walked in the kitchen and saw Sylvia with her head inside the oven.

I feel just as pretty as you thinking I can't write poetry.

I'm going to come clean
I think that some things are so dirty around here sometimes
that when I wake up on the floor with my face half stuck, half painted to the canvas
it can still make me feel all sorts of
pretty.

I'm going to come clean
I have been all different kinds of mean in this life
walked all over everything that shouldn't be walked on
and loved people despite how unlucky they were,
relied on nothing more than being pretty
so that we could eat dinner at night.

And when you said that there is such a thing
as being too pretty to succeed at the only thing that makes feelings worth having,
well, I'm going to come clean,
I can't do anything but disagree.

If you've never seen Buddy tell a story and shoot from tears right into the biggest smile you've ever seen -
this poem is too pretty for you.

If you've never gotten in your car and drove more than two hours
to hear a person you've never met before read a poem about champagne
you've got no idea what the phrase "too pretty" even means .

Not knowing if that sound was the gunshots or your heart,
pretty.

Walking into the hotel lobby and getting drunk with the piano player at the hotel bar,
pretty.

Falling in love and falling out of love and falling in love again
just to find out that you had it right the first time,
too pretty.

I'm going to come clean
I have been someone's one night stand
way too many times.

I am addicted to the feeling you get in your stomach
right before something real big happens
that you didn't see coming.

The look on my face is sometimes, yes, pretty,
but other times it's so broken.

I am going to come clean.

I run away from people who are stronger than me.

I have cheated more than once, lied more than once
and buried a friend more than once.

I have killed so many dreams before they ever even had a chance
and having my first child, it's just one of them.

I have never told anyone the whole truth
except the strangers who come to hear my poetry,
so to be too pretty to get those secrets out
just so it doesn't haunt me
is something I'm going to take personally.

I am too stubborn for my own good, yes
Too proud to fall in love seriously, yes
Too pretty to write poetry, yes

So clean now
that I stand here before you with no more secrets left,
yes.

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