{"id":5167,"date":"2025-08-05T19:29:26","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T19:29:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.rutgers.edu\/writers-house-review\/?page_id=5167"},"modified":"2026-03-08T12:08:35","modified_gmt":"2026-03-08T12:08:35","slug":"two-poems-5","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.rutgers.edu\/writers-house-review\/vol-6-winter-2025-2027\/two-poems-5\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Poems"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Ariana Guadagnino<\/em><\/h4>\n
\n

 <\/p>\n

What I Meant to Say<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I meant to tell you that the house still smells like cumin and soap,<\/span><\/p>\n

that I press my fingers into the worn wood of the table<\/span><\/p>\n

where you once rolled cigarettes,<\/span><\/p>\n

your hands quick, sure, as if they had always known<\/span><\/p>\n

how to break something open without shattering it completely.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But what I meant to say, what I never say,<\/span><\/p>\n

is that I\u2019ve been learning how to leave.<\/span><\/p>\n

How to give you an open ending,<\/span><\/p>\n

with no opportunities to fill up the gaps.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I trace my name into the condensation on the window,<\/span><\/p>\n

watch it fade as the kitchen warms.<\/span><\/p>\n

I wonder if you ever wanted to go,<\/span><\/p>\n

if the walls ever felt too tight,<\/span><\/p>\n

if the silence after an argument<\/span><\/p>\n

settled in your chest the way it does in mine\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

thick as wool, heavy as a swallowed stone.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You tell me I have grandma\u2019s laugh.<\/span><\/p>\n

What you don\u2019t say is that I have her quiet, too.<\/span><\/p>\n

Her tendency to let rooms fill with ghosts,<\/span><\/p>\n

to press her grief into the dough,<\/span><\/p>\n

knead it until it disappears.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I meant to tell you that I see it now,<\/span><\/p>\n

the way we carry what we never say\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

in the way we set the table,<\/span><\/p>\n

in the way we rinse our plates clean,<\/span><\/p>\n

in the way we hold our breath when we leave<\/span><\/p>\n

but never call each other back.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What I meant to say is <\/span>I love you<\/span><\/i>, I do.<\/span><\/p>\n

But love should not always mean staying.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

I Was Not Meant to Bloom<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I was not meant to bloom.<\/span><\/p>\n

Not in that house where love was a locked door,<\/span><\/p>\n

where silence sat heavy on my chest,<\/span><\/p>\n

where her voice could strip the paint from the walls,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

where I learned early that hunger<\/span><\/p>\n

was more than just something your stomach did.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

She was a storm with no rain,<\/span><\/p>\n

a mother by title, a ghost by presence.<\/span><\/p>\n

I grew up reading the weather in her face,<\/span><\/p>\n

knowing when to disappear,<\/span><\/p>\n

when to brace for impact,<\/span><\/p>\n

when to be still enough to be <\/span>forgotten.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And yet\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

here I am.<\/span><\/p>\n

Not a <\/span>shadow<\/span><\/i>, not a <\/span>wound<\/span><\/i>,<\/span><\/p>\n

not the sum of what she took.<\/span><\/p>\n

I built my own hands from the absence of hers,<\/span><\/p>\n

stitched my own softness from scraps.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I was not meant to bloom,<\/span><\/p>\n

but look at me now\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

roots deep, petals wide,<\/span><\/p>\n

alive despite it all.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

Ariana Guadagnino<\/strong> was born and raised in Toms River, New Jersey, and is expected to graduate in 2028 with a PhD in pharmacy. From the moment she could pick up a pencil, she has used any blank surface to express her thoughts. Whether it was through childish doodles or pieces of poetry like this, the world has been her canvas.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ariana<\/span> wrote these poems in a course taught by Leslieann Hobayan, who selected these pieces for inclusion in WHR<\/i>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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