courage

courage, I cry, as my breath heaves in,
time is your only enemy and the minutes put their hands around my throat,
strangling me, the bruises aching beneath their grip, my gasps holding under their spell
I know they won’t stop, and I like it, my soul in anarchy against their control
courage,
my stomach heaves in anticipation of the next blow,
I’m able to stop it but I can’t,
trapped in the shackles of my own anxiety and trepidation,
my wrists rubbing raw, I regret every attempt of escape
I want you to help me, point me in the right direction, hand me a key,
but I know you won’t come

the most essential nutrient

I always imagine it more like a sizzle,
cold droplets dissipating on first contact
hot metal eating away at them, scarfing them down,
one second
and it's in the air
in your mouth
caressing your skin, warming your fingertips,
it will fall with you
and silently mirror your innards
and you can't get rid of it
because you don't know it's there.

hey hey,
I'm waiting for you.

smoke windows

so did you just stop writing? the words I held onto for so long drift like smoke between my ears, an empty head full of mists that resemble something substantial, playing on my emotions like they hold the power that my brain might.
               
              but where did it go?
where did you go, your words always painting a picture of my emotions, giving voice to things I couldn't say. now I'm here and it's 11:11 and I'm confused about where you went and why you thought you could just disappear, and I have so many things to ask you, and I don't know why it's always you I think about when I'm alone with myself and my smoke-brain.

maybe it's your words, lingering like unwanted guests in the forgotten corners of my brain. can you dust while you're back there?

if you were here I'd tell you about how my eyes sting when I think about your hugs, wrapping around me and keeping me safe. I'd tell you about how much your words meant when I was burrowing deeper into my homemade pit of self-pity and distaste, how I knew you never got impatient with listening to me or making me feel better.

or maybe you did, maybe that's why you stopped, came over to say goodbye, went on a plane and never resurfaced from the oceans of your own self-discovery. maybe this whole time I was a weight and you were strong until you weren't.

anyway, I need you and I need the broken glass and hours of smoke, folding around me in beams of colored and entering my brain while I dance, dance, dance--

I knew I would never be able to let you go.

unreality

playing in my mind
walking through forests of uncertainty
dew droplets shimmering like some kind of incandescent
hidden giddiness
smoke billowing into rays of sunshine
every morning a choice,
every evening a consequence

"eat it up, it's yours"

I don't want to but I can't stop
I never wanted to start
fever dreams bleeding into a porous reality,
trusting the sponge of my senses while it's completely
saturated with tainted versions of the stories I tell myself

"just take it"

reaching out but I can't feel it
am I dreaming?
the glittery outline taunts me with its promise  of something
tangible, a void-filling presence that is exactly what
everyone is telling me I want

shh, shh, shh,
sounds of the wind echo closer
or is it the ocean?