Emily Saldivia specializes in slam poetry and the written word with a passion for shedding light on her personal experiences. Living in Los Angeles, she hopes to one day be able to share her works with as many people as possible.
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“Holding Hands”
Time is a fickle thing
i feel him moving
his arms wrapping around me
numbers suffocating, digits and fingers
the ticking, he drowns out my thoughts
Time warps with my mind
he kills my subconscious
makes me feel and makes me think
think of things i no longer need
needing space and proximity
proximity of his body
body and heat, heart and blood
Time is a welcomed old friend
he holds the door open
knows my favorite places
follows me to all my dreams
i never have enough time with Time
kind eyes yet a firm grip
there is a familiarity between us
i hold hands with Time
we have both been here before
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“A Love Poem”
I used to write love poems to remind myself what love should feel like. But my tongue has forgotten how to quiver, shake like it’s being acknowledged. My voice forgot how its crescendo rang through the air, never desirable but always required. I forgot how to write love poems,
the phrases aren’t as simple as they were,
a metaphor,
a simile,
a smitten ache in my throat.
I tried to play the piano with my eyelashes yesterday, but my mind told my hands to play instead.
My feet no longer lingered in the shopping isle, but stomped and rang, pointed in the same direction as a compass.
I refused to write love poems, my pen is out of ink and my notebooks have been filled. No longer is there a need to prove nature that my emotions are just as clear as its reflection. I swore I would never write love poems again.
The trees will still dance while I am asleep, water moving without a care, the world still rotating beneath my feet, carelessly and with a purpose. Perhaps I will learn to write poems that aren’t about love, or perhaps, love will write a poem about me.
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“Ecstatic”
Medium: Ink
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“Pink Syringe”
Love is not a cure.
It is not prescribed,
or handed out in clinics.
It does not heal a burn,
or make scars disappear.
Love is not pink and glitter in a syringe. It is not popped like pills,
or taken down the throat.
We think that our love can fix others, but it can’t.
So when it doesn’t,
we think it useless.
Love cannot cure,
but it can heal.
A band aid does not fix the cut, but it protects it from germs.
Only the body can cure oneself. Love merely protects it.
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“Love on the Brain”
Medium: Ink
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“The Song of My Sanity: An Ode to Poets”
The song of my sanity isn’t catchy.
There is no beat or rhyme,
No reason.
You can’t hear it on the radio during rush hour,
Mixed CD or playlist.
The song of my sanity isn’t a song but a poem.
Words vibrating from meaning and not bass,
I have blown too many headphones listening to it on repeat. And if in fact, it is not a song but a poem,
Then I guess you’d have to call me a poet.
And yet, I would say I didn’t know it,
Didn’t like it,
Couldn’t listen to it.
Because I hear my poetry as “wait for it”.
Not a poet of the body or soul,
Not a poet of woman or man,
Save that for the old men in history.
Years and years ago when my existence was never a thought, But all they thought of was existence.
The tree that I contemplate on were the seeds that they rooted, Mountains were once anthills,
A leaf of grass was once a forest.
They saw old and young,
Foolish or wise,
Flesh and appetite.
And I’d guess you’d have to call them poets.
But none of them knew it,
Never saw it,
Never listened to it,
Because they heard their poetry as “wait for it”.
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“My Body, My Soul”
Medium: Ink, Watercolor
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“The Meaning of Life in English 101”
This is how you breathe without trying, blink without thinking, live without meaning. But sometimes I forget to blink when I’m driving,
Hold my breath back in my throat.
Swallow it down like the gravel in my cereal,
Like Fruity Pebbles are actually pebbles,
Like Frosted Flakes are actually paint chips.
But what I really mean is sometimes I don’t know how to work my lungs, Have to remind them how good air tastes like.
Like static in my brain,
Like trying to compare something that’s already been compared to.
It’s like sitting in English class, saying the curtain is blue because of sadness but Robert Frost just thought it matched the rug.
Finding symbolism in Dante’s inferno but no one wondered if he was just a pyro. Dickinson saying she wanted to be a bird to fly away from reality but maybe she just wanted to grow wings.
People stopping to read what they wrote,
Thinking poets know the meaning of life but they don’t.
And if some people can live without meaning then I guess I can write without worry, Metaphors and similes spewed on the floor.
Compare things to summer days and hopefully no one will question it,
Hopefully no one will think too hard and ask what I mean,
Because I never mean what I actually say.
But saying it has some sort of hidden meaning will keep them guessing. And I guess that’s what poetry is,
Find the hidden meaning in life and live it.
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“Attached”
Medium: Ink
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“405 to LAX”
They say that running away from your problems never solves anything, By packing a suitcase feels like running a marathon.
I am out of breath and suffocating,
Anxious and regretful of the life I am living.
Is this all of its worth?
Because running away sounds like everything I want it to be and more. I am tired of all the sleeping,
I am thirsty after all the drowning.
California beaches sound amazing until the shine from La La Land fades away, And I wonder what it says about me
That I feel like a dead tree;
Never moving, never growing.
And why am I the only person that enjoys driving to LAX?
Call me crazy but my cabin fever is breaking,
I’ve got one foot out the door and the other in a carry-on.
But I always learnt adventure as “wait for it”,
As a bullet point on the bucket list.
And maybe you can say that I’m not running away,
But rather towards something.
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“All Star”
Medium: Ink
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“Tar Feet”
I have a terrible fear of sharks.
Seven year old me trembled during Jaws
Spielberg knew the children he’d scar
Scar and ruin, burst into tears and fear
I still refuse to go into the pool
Know when I do I’ll hear,
“Duuun dun duuun dun dun dun”
So raise a glass of salt water to Steven Spielberg Because logic says that’s seaweed touching my leg Says don’t you dare panic and scream
Says you’re in 3 feet deep
Says I know that isn’t Spongebob
Get lifted out of the sea and see the tar on my feet Tar on my feet from California beach
And the child in me gets quiet, finger to mouth
No longer says a word
Never heard silence this deafening
A banshee of the beach
An echo of an ecosystem’s obituary
I guess I missed the funeral
Didn’t know the sea could burn me to the third degree And I guess I should be happy cause the sharks are dying out But then who would be the villain for Finding Nemo “Fish are friends”
So why aren’t we living by a cartoon’s philosophy? But rather enjoy putting tar in the sea
Tar on my feet
Tar like debris
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“Glass Bottom Boat”
Medium: Pencil
