You’re not her & College Town Musings by Kenna DeValor
you’re not her
the moment i saw you
your face a faded but familiar melody
not heard by my loving mind in so long
you're not her, i know that-
but you look so much like her my heart fluttered again
like I did when I was sixteen
it was like looking into the past
of another dimension
of another universe when i got another chance
you're not her, i know that-
but the way your hazel eyes
glow with warmth as if I were visiting an old friend as if
you had left a candle burning in the window
welcoming me home again
you're not her, i know that-
but you have her hair, furrowed brow, her brilliant mind
perhaps even more brilliant.
even as you sit beside me;
sharing music, exchanging words,
I feel like I'm visiting a house that was laid to rest by flame, now rebuilt.
I promised to read Twelfth Night for you, as you read Taming of The Shrew
but I'm tired of Shakespeare and
I'm tired of lying to myself and
letting my heart ghostwrite my emotions.
you're not her, i know that
but when you leaned on my shoulder
and wrapped your arms in mine
I can't completely lie if I didn't feel a small sense
of an old feeling. A feeling I thought I'd forgotten.
It nearly made me tear up
as I would seeing a long lost friend
after so long. It's been so long.
It frustrates me how much you look like her.
Maybe we'll never see each other again
After this summer is over and done,
and the decay of fall sets in,
but even getting moments to start again
was worth the hurt and I'm wiping my tired feet
on the welcome mat.
Even though this home feels familiar,
and I want you to keep the candles burning in the window,
and the music playing, I know I cannot stay.
But for now, the heartache and I deserve to sit down with you
and have tea for just a little while.
College Town Musings
Street lamps filtered orange by
Simple syrup gossamer
Cardboard buildings that seemed to
not care about the sky that was so vast above them
Boxes of people in small apartments
lonely blues and reds and greens
a sign of life inside being a moving shadow or
potted plant constantly peering down in the window
Diluted sounds of laughing and joyful exclamations on the otherwise quiet strip
God, I wish I could be that unabashed and unafraid
Maybe one day someone will peek up at my window and ask themselves what i'm up to
envisioning a beautiful-storybook-romanticized life
The first time I felt the touch
of the person I'm sure I'm going to marry,
It was truly the first time
my small studio apartment felt full of life.
The first time that my itchy tweed jacket
didn't feel like my only friend.
maybe this life would be best suited
for someone who wasn't so independent,
but maybe falling and failing and losing
isn't something I should be afraid of,
We are just still overgrown kids after all.
I always root for the underdog anyway.
“You’re Not Her: It was a (secret) small shallow musing that I had for someone. It was all because she looked like someone I once dated and it was just truly the strangest thing. I was looking at this girl who looked exactly like my ex but she was so different at the same time, and I knew that being drawn to her at first for that reason was so shallow and they were feelings I didn’t like to highlight. Yet, I wrote this piece to air out my thoughts because I couldn’t help but look back at times that I remember with my ex even years later. Memories that are beginning to fade but I still feel under my skin like ink from a tattoo. It feels like a home I once lived in, but someone else lives there now and everything is different.
College Town Musings: I used to be a poet that would revel in my own pretentiousness and it was..not cute. So I tried to still hold onto that fancy-schmancy persona while I began to grow out of it. As if to be like “Oh, hey! I can still write! Look at me!” It just never fit anywhere and that’s okay.”
Kenna DeValor (they/them) is a literature major and creative writing minor at Bloomsburg University in Bloomsburg, PA. When they aren’t writing, they are usually dyeing their hair funky colors, haunting local thrift shops looking for the next vintage find, or perusing inside bookshops. Additionally, Kenna has a background in theater, voice acting, and music composition. They describe their piece(s) as: “liminal feelings and spaces.” They are always down for gothic literature recommendations. Their (non-trashed) work was most recently featured in ‘Chill Mag - The Green Issue’. (Nov. 2023) You can find them fluttering around nearly every platform as: @teadragonz