Spiral Notebook

There's some that say that your autobiography
resides next to textbooks on your
working desk,
with pages bound by a silver coil.

You'd never know. It's a simple thing
filled with English essays and homework dates,
and diagrams and research labs

and poetry.
Poetry that seems to fall off the page,
and phrases that defy rigid, ruled lines.

There are secret messages addressed to no one
subtitled under pencilled doodles in the margin
teetering so close to the edge, next to a
mindless, distracted hand.

The etched mistakes are long-gone and erased,
the dust clinging to the page
as spearmint breath blows the
remnants of imagination away.

There are blemishes on these
dog-eared, weary pages.
A sticky ring on the cover from the time
your best friend used it as a
Starbucks coaster.
The visible imperfections of
caffeine addictions.

And through all this, you knew you should've been
mapping out the world in an
educational pencil red.
Ironic, how you ended up mapping
the confused contents of your
imagination instead.