Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The hands that I held yours with are soaked in so much blood.
The blood streaking down my arms
The blood filling up my palms
The blood falling down my lips.

What I’m saying is if I were stabbed with a knife would it hurt more than I already do?
What I’m saying is I already stabbed myself with a knife.

And it felt better than I ever have before.

If I can’t get what I need to look like myself, the least I can do is try to carve myself out.
“God made you a girl so you’ll always be my daughter”

If this “god” you speak of is the reason why my brothers and my sisters and my siblings have taken their own lives because they needed to carve themselves out too then his sins outnumber my own

Chapter Text

My life begins at 6:09 AM
I awake crying, trapped in a vessel that in no way resembles my own
This life seems alien to me, but some instinct forces me to follow routine

At 8:03 unfamiliar places and faces rush in and out of view
These things die the second I close my eyes but come back to life the second I open them

At 10:37 there is no way to comprehend these voices that look different each day
No way to match these strangers who tell me they love me
I want to love them too

But how can I when they die the second I’m not looking
How can I when each conversation we have floats in one ear and out the other
How can I when each time I try to talk my voice sabotages itself into silence
How can I when my concept of love is completely different than theirs?

All of my friends die the second the clock hits 3
I turn my back to leave and everyone vanishes
Where are they?
Who are they?
Why did I love them?
Will they ever come back?

I die at 8:34 PM
A life of too-bright lights and head-drilling noises and novel experiences cease
I pass away slowly in my sleep
Will this peace finally kill me in a way that matters?
Repeat

Chapter Text

The cross on the wall mocks me as it dances to it’s sugar sweet hymns
Inside the church that was built on the ashes of the women who were burned for not submitting
The church that was built on the blood of the queers who died of a single page
The church that was built on the bones of the people of color who were stripped of their homes

You wretch you whore you sinful disgrace you’re dirty you’re broken you’re nothing without god

Nobody is perfect but god, but you have to be like god but you’ll never be like god but you’ll never be perfect so why even try?
We all sin but god will forgive you but if you sin you’re gonna go to hell because you've sinned

Even if I took my own life I would never get in to heaven

All of that was thrown onto my sholdours at the age of four, yet I'm too young to tell you my pronouns ten years later?
It's all a torture of your own making
Why can't I leave the torture of your own making?
I knelt before you as a child, unaware that your thrown was built of lies

I carve lines down my wrists with the crusifix then wash it with holy water so that the blood won't show
I try to strangle myself with the rosary and overdose with communion wine

People who take their own life don't go to Heaven
Fuck Heaven

Chapter Text

“She’s a girl, there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s a good thing you didn’t fight back.”

For saying that I will reap the teeth that were sewn into your foolish mouth
I should have fought back
But that would make me a bad person
“Just let her”

Those words wander through my brain
Float through my veins
Crawl up my bones
And claw up my skin

They run almost as fast as the faces of the people who…

Those faces haunt my body
They walk through the hallways of my heart
They run in and out of my nerves
And cling onto my eyes

They are burglars searching for valuable goods
And they found them

Two of the burglars have been captured, but not the third one

She is smaller and younger than the rest
She could do no wrong
She couldn’t have cornered me
She couldn’t have shouted threats
She couldn’t have broken through my belt
I couldn’t have fought back

Because she’s a girl
And I’m a boy

Chapter Text

Hope is fragile
Hope has dirt on his face and blood on his knuckles
Hope has disheveled hair and wrinkled clothes
Hope has dried tears streaking his face and eyes welling with more
Hope struggles to get out of bed yet is pulling himself off of the ground for another fight
Hope gets knocked off his feet and starts sinking
The cold water swallows hope down
Hope is sinking
Down
Farther
Colder
Darker
If you go deep enough into the ocean you will find hope
Hope surrounded by small specks of light called bioluminescence
Up
Further
Colder
Darker
If you go high enough into the sky you will find hope
Hope surrounded by small specks of light called stars
The universe is an endless fractal
Hope will be waiting for you
Even when they reap your world with everything they have
You know that they would steal even the sky from you
Hope will be waiting for you
Waiting to comfort you if you need it
Waiting to wipe the blood off his hands and fight some more if you need it

Chapter Text

“Who said the words ‘I’m sorry’ so much that it made you hate it?”

I did

Not an apology anymore but a beg
Begging you to stop
Begging you to accept my apology
If I apologize will you stop?

I’m sorry
I’m sorry
I’m sorry
I’m sorry
I’m sorry
I’m sorry
I’m sorry

Screaming it now
At the top of my lungs
I’m sorry

The monster standing over me
As the sky grew black
My beg bouncing off of the monster
I shrunk as the monster surrounded me

Please stop
I’m sorry

Chapter Text

Mom, can you come pick me up?
Sounds are starting to feel like slaps to the face
And lights are starting to look like lasers
And my heartbeat is starting to claw at my skin
And people are staring

Mom can you come pick me up?
I’m scared and I wanna go home

If I forget everything bad
If I forget how you scream at me for being myself?
If I forget how you refuse to speak when I mess up?
If I forget that you threaten me with your words?
Mom come pick me up, I’m scared

Can you please drive me home?
And when I get there can you drive me home again?
Because it doesn’t feel like home
I just wanna go home

But I have to find it first

Chapter Text

Let my pallium exhaust
Let moss grow over my tear-stained face

Let my eyes be replaced with the prettiest of trees
Let my chest be replaced with dirt

Let me fossilize in peace
Let the forest swallow me whole
Let the pure joy flowing from my fingers silence the forest

Let the ground become my home
Let me become a legend of the forest

Chapter Text

The art of rituals
It could be as simple as blowing out candles
Birthday candles
Or drinking water to clear your throat

It’s a way to cope
To defy the hallowed that harmed me

What is everything made of but atoms?
What are atoms made of but protons
What are protons made of but quarks
What are quarks made of but energy

Energy constructs everything
A ritual cast to brighten your day
It is but a decision to let it

Like an army of poppets
Or the familiar scent of home
The art of rituals
The beauty of placebo

Chapter Text

You’ll know when She comes to town
You’ll see her again
Her curves rounder than ever
You can feel her waist shrinking
Face more feminine than last time
Jaw softer
Shorter
Hips bigger
Hair longer
She’s stronger
You’re hopeless against her

You’ll try starving her out
Covering yourself in baggy cloth to hide away
Curling up and screaming her name

But when She comes to town
There’s only one way to make her leave
Carving a knife down her arm

Chapter Text

The soft yellow of brimstone
The captivating dance of flame
A place where both soul and body are destroyed
It sounds so peaceful

A place for those who have defied
Those damned for honorable defiance

We hear your protests
The queers are going to hell
The atheists are going to hell
The punks are going to hell
The feminists are going to hell
The witches are going to hell
This is gonna be fun

We will comfort those who lost the battle to depression
We will provide community for the homeless
We will let the witches heal us
We will let the protesters rally

They have always prayed for the sinners
But they never prayed for the sinner who needed it the most
The fallen angel
The ultimate defiance
So we’ll keep him company instead

Chapter Text

The name falls from my lips so easily
Much better than the old brick that used to fall from my voice

From hair cut so short that you can see my scalp
To a surgery that will let me breathe
Each time I can see myself in the mirror
It makes me smile

From my heart racing with joy the first time I was called “Young Man”
To my heart racing with fear when I am mistaken for that girl

But nothing can beat it
The fact that one day I can look in the mirror
And find myself staring back

Chapter Text

I love you like joy likes the depressed
I love you like tragedy likes monsters

I love you like monsters love the solitary
I love you like the trees like speaking
I love you like Mothman likes flying
And a naiad likes swimming

I love you like the sound of leaves crunching under footsteps
I love you like the texture of fur
I love you like the sounds that scratch my brain
I love you like fire likes passion

I love you like a friend

Chapter Text

Mortifying ordeal of being known

Embarrassing

To be known
To be loved for who you are
To have companionship
Opposingly
To never let your guard down
To fear vulnerability
Not knowing how to communicate
Stories
Feelings
Thoughts
Forever trapped inside your head
To let them out of your mouth would make you crazy
I was crazy once

Chapter Text

Why don’t trees wilt under your touch
Why don’t leaves catch fire at your glare
Why doesn’t the forest grow quiet at your arrival
Why don’t flowers follow in your footsteps
Because you don’t exist

My love for the man I have never met
The man I never will meet
The man that will remain in my dreams
I will never love a man such as you
For my mind is too complex for such romantic simplicities
I shall instead become that man
For when I look in the mirror
I have yet to see even a boy

Chapter Text

She dances with passion
Leaving a trail of dark destruction in her path
Her captivating enchantment
I could watch her for hours

I love you
I would burn life itself for you
I would love you as long as the forest would let me
For you would destroy him if I let you

My two loves

He sways to her melody
Leaving life and living still around him
His mysterious and deep complexion
I could walk with him for miles

My Fire and My Forest
One brings destruction and the other brings life

The captivating enchantment of Fire
and the faithful mystery of Forest

Words cannot describe
The way my two loves
Bring me peace

Chapter Text

Hello

You don’t know me
But I know you
You’re reading my words
You’re taking time out of your day to listen to me

It’s very peaceful here
With me
With you
Together

You’re lonely
I’m lonely too
There are not many companions ammongst these pages
Would you like to be companions?
It would be nice

Alas
Everything must come to an end
Including this poem
I know you will be alright
When this poem comes to an end
But will I?
No
Can I say one final thing
Before our companionship comes to an end?

Thank you
For giving me a voice

I’m sorry
I know that once you finish this poem
I’ll pass on

Please
Please don’t stop reading
I don’t wanna die

Chapter Text

At my armageddon
Covered with flames
The flames that course through my veins
That need to be freed by my fingertips
The flames that burn in my heart
With passion and with fear

Adrenaline blurs my brain as I reach for my weapon
The weapon that will sever the fight with my opponent

The battle doesn't need to happen
Does it?
Will the image of my contender's neck snapped
The pool of blood that my contender's body lies in
The people that my contender knew and loved
The people that my contender built beautiful relationships with
They will be left in grief
Did my contender know to cut ties with everyone he knew before he came to fight this losing battle?
Did he know that they would hurt less if he abandoned everyone before his death?
Right?

Will ending my contender be worth it?
Will the suffering he went through for this fight.
The pain
The trauma
Will the future be worth it for having to endure this suffering?

The future where he might have the chance of happiness?
Will the suffering even be worth it for the joy?
The joy of winning the fight?

Chapter Text

The Forest and I kissed
The crackle of leaves below our feet
Pressed against damp tree bark

Let us sleep on the bed of moss
Together

Let the Forest muss my hair
As I knead the Forest's stalk

The Forest and I kissed
Setting flames through his crown

Sweet as sap and gentle as night
So beautiful that the stars set fire to the sky
Just to watch

Fire from leaves to roots
Fire sending endorphins through our minds

The Forest and I kissed
And we both fell silent

Chapter Text

I can no longer hear my Wind
The wind that followed me everywhere
She carried all the sounds
The hums of machines
The cars passing by blocks away
The pitched voices drilling into my skull

With my ears protected

Protected from Wind
Wind and all of her sounds

The silence is whimsical
The silence is peaceful
The science is beautiful

Wind is still there
But she’s nicer now
Asleep behind my headphones

Chapter Text

The Forest remembers you
Ever since you got lost in him

You entered when you were young and innocent
You looked around
Only to find that you were lost
He still remembers you

He remembers you falling to the floor
Pulling your hair
Clutching your chest
Scratching the fear out of your skin
The Forest was watching
With tears in his eyes

Trying to comfort you
In vain
And he still is
Trying to comfort you

You got lost in the Forest
And you learned things
Things nobody should know
And when you left
You weren’t very innocent anymore

Chapter Text

I want to drink the holiest of red wine
Then write drunken poetry
That spits in gods face

I want to lay in a bed of trees
Surrounded by the myths of the forest

I want to capture fire
In the palm of my hand
And make her dance to the rhythm of my heartbeat

I want to silence the wind
With the rocking of my body
And the stims of my voice

I want to see the scars on my chest
And the strength in my jaw

I don’t want to survive
I want to live

Chapter Text

Do you still believe in god?

If you do
Get on your fucking hands and knees
And start begging

Beg for my mom to call me her son
Just once

Beg for me to make it past eighteen

Because god knows
They didn't

Chapter Text

Almost there
Keep running

Breathe
In and out
Feel it burn

Feet pounding on the ground

Running
Something you've had to do since day one

But not running away this time
Running towards it
Eighteen

Tell yourself that you're getting closer
Keep running

Don't fumble
Don't fall

Running for years
Only a few more to go

All you have to do is run

Think of it
When you can see it in the distance
Eighteen
Imagine
Your hope restored
So close
Out of breath
Everything goes black

The floor crumbles beneath you
Keep running
But this time

You can't
You were so close

Chapter Text

Conversing is like a delicate waltz
1 2 3
Your partner steps forward with a “Hello”
You reciprocate
2 2 3
A step to the right is a “How was your day”
You keep up with a “Good, and you?”
3 2 3
Your partner continues the waltz with a step back and a “Good”
Your feet come back together as the conversation
And the dance
End

1 2 3. 2 2 3. 3 2 3.
Simple as that
Having a conversation
Simple as a waltz

1 2 3..
But what if someone breaks the rules
4…
Goes off script
1…
Chaos

1 2 3
How is it
That one can understand both everything
2 2 3
And nothing
3 2 3
At the same time

1 2 3. 2 2 3. 3 2 3.
How is it
1 2 3
That I could tell you everything you would ever need to know
2 2 3
About Mothman
3 2 3
Or incongruities
4 2 3
But a simple conversation
Or the difference between left and right
Is my weakness

1 2 3. 2 2 3. 3 2 3.
Don’t miss the tempo

Why is it that I can remember musicals word for word
1 2 3
And music note for note
2 2 3
But the second my friends leave my view
3 2 3
I’m convinced they have ceased to exist

1 2 3. 2 2 3. 3 2 3.
To roll or revolve
A conversation
A waltz
One will never master

Chapter Text

Letters have abandoned me
Nothing to romanticize
No words to vent
They’ve left me alone
Like so many things have before

If I had a seed

For everything that has done the same
The people who have drifted on
The thoughts that were left to be nothing more
The words that have escaped me

I would have enough seeds
To plant a forest
That would provide enough words
To give me a voice
So that nothing can abandon me again

Chapter Text

I’ll blow a kiss into the forest
So gentle and sweet
That the flowers bloom at my breath
And not even five minutes later
I’ll stick a rag soaked in petrol and blood
Inside of a bottle
I’ll light it on fire
And throw it at the station
Both the kiss and the cocktail
Are for freedom

Chapter Text

There is a star
Named 61 Cygni
Who is eleven light years away
Which means
That she is out there
Watching little me
Climb out of my bed at night
To sit on the windowsill
And watch as the world passes me by

Chapter Text

Encased in a glass pot
Floating on a bed of wax
Sometimes he’ll sway with the wind
Sometimes he’ll stand up still
Sometimes he’ll flicker and dance

If I feed him he’ll sway
But if I let him out of his glass
He will eat everything I love
And leave nothing but ash in it’s place

When it’s his time to pass on
He will flicker and flash
Before turning blue and dying

When he’s gone
His smoke will caress my cheek
And fill my lungs
With the painful reminder
That he was once here

Chapter Text

Pacing
Back and forth
Back and forth
Around my windowless cell

Executed
I’m gonna be executed

But when
I need to know when
I need to know when
They’re not gonna tell me
Because it has to be a surprise
They said it would be a surprise

It can’t be Friday
Because if it hasn’t happened by Thursday
Then it would have to happen Friday
That’s not much of a surprise

That means it can’t happen Thursday
Either
Because if it hasn’t happened by Wednesday
Then it would have to happen Thursday
That’s not much of a surprise

If I keep going
If I keep convincing
If I keep thinking like this
Then it can’t ever happen
So maybe I’ll live
I want to live

Because I’ve ruled out Friday
And I’ve ruled out Thursday
So I’ll have to rule out Wednesday
Then Tuesday
Then Monday

I’ll get to live
I’ll get to see my family
I’ll get to see the sunrise
Because if it can’t be a surprise
Then they’re not gonna-

I was hanged Wednesday
It was a surprise

Chapter Text

Their memory is a tapestry that has long since faded
A beautiful collage filled with understanding and pride
As long as you’re happier than I could have made you

No need to have a tearful goodbye
No need to cry or say
I’ll miss you
The grief will still be there
Bleeding
Weeping
Pouring blood from an unstitched wound
Unstitched just like the tapestry
Of memories
That we could have made

Chapter Text

Beneath a disheveled tree
With unsightly branches stretching out toward the sky
Lays the remains of today
With flowers growing from it’s scars
It's skin paling
And moss growing up it's legs
Connecting it to the earth below

Surrounded by wildlife
Wildlife that feeds off of the life that was once mine

Animals that go about their lives
Trees that feed off of the sun
Bugs that pray to the sky that nobody kills them for the crime of being small

Drifting off to sleep
Beneath the tree
Surrounded by beautiful life
While I'm losing mine

Chapter Text

Inside a cave
A cave so dark that even if you open your eyes
As wide as you can
You will see nothing but darkness

Curled up on the floor
Knees up to your chin
Arms wrapped around your legs
Beneath a waterfall
Water pelting your skin
Drenching your hair
As the same water falls from your eyes

Pinned to the floor
By the reflection that you saw
In the very same water that is covering you now

Fire burning your ribs
Skin cold as ice
As you choke on the disgust that coats your skin

Chapter Text

It’s not just lumps of flesh
And burning ribs

It’s skin made of ghosts
It’s another soul left to die on the back porch
It’s bile on your lips
It’s blood painting your skin

It’s a body that would be beautiful
If only it wasn’t mine
It’s catching your face in your hands
Only for it to burn even worse

Somewhere in the forest
Birds take flight
Plants keep singing
And trees go about their day

But here?
It’s a lost childhood
Eyes that could have been filled with wonder
Are filled instead with hurt

Chapter Text

You may not understand
Why I stop to watch the leaves
Or why I spend hours stacking blocks
And laugh when they fall

Or why I cover my ears
For eleven hours a day

But she did

Nobody else
Would cover for me like you did
Nobody else
Would be so gentle
So understanding
So accommodating
For just me

But now
You’re leaving
And there’s nothing for me to say
Not anymore

Chapter Text

I know it’s not a good thing
But we will create our own good
Just like we have created our own bad

Because
How can something do pure
So happy
So true
Be so monstrous?

If we are monsters
Simply for being right
Then, hell
It’s not us who are wrong
It’s not us who are the monsters

Chapter Text

People will separate their sons
From the most beautiful of fabrics
And the prettiest of jewels
For fear of raising a poet
Instead of a warlord

People will deny their daughters
The majesty of nature
And the most abundant of colors
For fear of raising a warlord
Instead of a poet

For people are stupid
They are unaware
That if warlords are separated from poets
They will have fighting done by thinkers
And thinking done by fools

And the children are suffering
And the children are rude
Because some can’t possibly be warlords
And some can’t possibly be poets
For one is not the other
And the other is not one

Chapter Text

I know that I should not know so much
Because it's dangerous
And leads to nothing but thoughts
And pessimism

But don’t they always say
To never remove the knife
Once you get stabbed?
Because if you remove the knife
There will be nothing to stop the blood

I was stabbed with knowledge
And it hurts
But I fear that if I removed the knowledge that stabbed me
It won’t stop flowing

Chapter Text

I’ve never seen something more beautiful

Cellos like an ocean at night
A sound so deep and wide
Her song like an empty void
Her music cares for not time nor space nor you
You could disappear into her sound
And nobody would ever find you

Violas like a silky cloth left outside
Forgotten and complimented by the world
His sound so rich and gentle
His voice warm and loving
But he’s seen too much
Left outside
Only for his song to come back solemn
And hauntingly beautiful

Violins like little toy soldiers
Marching in lockstep
Their sound like tiny voices
Trying to hold up the earth

All strung together by one person
Who else could command an army
Calm an ocean
And temper the silk
Raising their voices like souls from their graves
While taking the time under their own wing
Conducting such a beautiful tapestry
Might as well be making the earth stand still
And listen

Chapter Text

It’s not a choice

From when I was four years old
Begging god to fix my fractured brain
Because my brain wanted to be a boy
And that wasn’t okay

To when I was ten years old
And I would see red
Every time someone branded me
With the word “she”

You tell me my body is a temple

To when I was twelve years old
And that temple came crumbling down
And I could feel nothing but disgust
Disgust and terror and hopelessness
At the body that I was told was mine

But instead it just belonged to some girl

To when I was fourteen years old
And I wanted to fix my temple
And take that girl’s body
And make it my own

Before I could do nothing
But watch
As my body mutated
Into hers

Too late
You knew they would never let you do that
They would never let you fix it
You stupid, stupid child

Each time the word transgender
Is pulled from their lips
It is followed by a trail of blood

A trail of blood that writes
“God doesn’t make mistakes”
“Just love yourself”
“You’ll want to be a woman when you grow up”
“Your body is a temple, you can’t change it”

That trail of blood leading me to a grave
Of it’s own making

My worst fears
You all only see me as a woman
And I’m gonna grow to be that woman
And there’s nothing I can do to stop it

Chapter Text

You see my scars that I gave myself
And you weep
Because how could your ¨precious baby girl¨
Do that to herself?

But there were already scars
Invisible scars lashed into my body
Given to me by you
Each time you called me ¨she¨
Or Her

You say that I am doing this because I hate myself

But I disagree

Because there is something holy
In the way I bind my chest
There is something beautiful
In the defiance that it takes
To overcome life

The fire inside of me burns hotter
Each time I am allowed to exist
And when I grow up
And I´m allowed to live

Then maybe
I´ll write a letter to her
That girl that I should have been
And tell her
That I love her

Chapter Text

When my brain turns cold
And I start to drown in my thoughts

Embers spark at the back of my neck
Sparking hotter and brighter
Until it travels down my spine
Into my fingers
And they burn
With the pain of ten thousand bees

Until that fire trapped inside me
Is finally out in front of me

And I look at it
With pride
Like a part of my soul
Or my own flesh and blood

Chapter Text

I am every tear
That I’ve ever cried
From the second I was born
To the second I’ll die

Maybe I’ll die in a hospital
Surrounded by family
Maybe I’ll die at the hands of hopelessness
With tears blurring my eyes

The simple fact
That tears taste like the ocean water
That makes up the earth

Would make one think
That all the tears
You’ve ever cried
Is as meaningful as the ocean

Chapter Text

What is love?

/Noun/
an intense feeling of deep affection

But what is it like to love?

Is it a feeling of bliss
That grows in your stomach
Whenever you see a person
That you like?
But that disappears
When they're gone?

Is it tolerance
Putting up with someone
Just because you're supposed to?

Is it both grief and joy
Joy so good that it makes you sad
Just to think of being away
From them?

Is it the bravest thing
That anybody can ever do?
Because love always comes with grief
And the notion
That your head will always end up broken

Is it something that feels different for everyone?
Or is it something that I just can't feel?

Because hugs just feel like danger
And words just feel like lies

Chapter Text

When your routine shoved you out of bed
Though the world felt like needles underneath your fingernails
And your home felt like the bottom of a pit
You still got ready for school
With blades lining your jacket sleeves
And flames styling your hair

When school felt like your only safe place
And you could let the boy inside the closet out
The scars on your skin bled through your sleeves
And the lies about how you got them bled through your teeth

When music class
Became your reason for living
The songs danced across the paper
And the urge to write a piece of art
Became greater than the urge to write a suicide note
But only for that hour

When it's time to go back home
And the tunnel of nightmares
Called your front door
Opens once more
And presents you to the people
Who holds your life in their hands
You retreat to bed
Because you can't die
If you're asleep

Chapter Text

Picture this

A bundle of sticks
Bound together by twine
Used as kindling for a fire

The fire dances and sways atop it
It looks so alive
So glorious
Throwing up sparks like confetti
As flames look soft as silk

This bundle of kindling is called a faggot

Yes,
The same words
Hurled at the backs of my siblings
Are akin to something as graceful
And painful
As fire

Is it because the passion
Of queer love
Burns as bright as the fire
That they use to burn us with?

Chapter Text

You never forget
The sound of needles scraping through flesh
It rings through my ears
And fills up the cracks of my brain
Like water in a glass of marbles

The marbles being my thoughts
And the water being the trauma
In between each of my thoughts

You never forget
How it feels to suffocate
Inside of an embrace

Which is why I don’t hug people

You never forget
How the adults would call you a wretch
In comparison to their god

I don’t know why they do this
The words that Christians hurl at us
Would be enough to make
The sky slice her own wrist, too

Who knew

You never forget
How so many people
Would see your body as a monster
Something that should be
“Eradicated from public life entirely”
But also something that makes violating it
Seem like a trophy

You never forget how terrible it felt
To have pulled up “girl”
From so deep in your brain
And cover yourself in it
With no room to breathe

You never forget
How often you were trapped in your own voice
Or stuck in a rhythm of rocking
Or smothered in words that won’t fit together
Or when talking just…
Didn’t happen

And then you never forget
How often you were yelled at about all of these
How they would stand over you
And degrade you until you were nothing

Sometimes I’m back there
To all of these places
Just trying to claw my way back out

Chapter Text

I never knew how to answer that question
“Who are you?”
I am a lot of things

I am a pile of faded orchestra hoodies in a pile on the ground
I am the height of the crescendo
Where I’ve stopped playing
But the rest of the orchestra get louder
Until I swear I could fly

I am all of my stims
And all of my tics
And I’m my mutism too

I am every word
That I have never said

I am every genuine laugh
That I have ever given
And I am every tear
That I have ever cried

I am a compilation of days
That would send any normal person crying on the floor

I was that little girl
Who was so caught up
In masking who I am
That she killed me
So I am myself
Who I’ve raised from the dead

I am a man
Who has torn down everything he knew
To rebuild it from scratch
For nobody but himself

I am not my body
Not yet at least
But I am my clothes

If you ask me to tell you about myself
I will resort to lies
And masks
But you’ll find me eventually
In my actions and my answers

Chapter Text

Dear Leaving,

In nine weekdays
And four weekends
I will never see you again

You say that we will meet again
But doesn't everyone say that?
After your last day
You will slowly fade out of my life
Along with these feelings

You once called me your favorite person
I didn't say it back because I was convinced you didn't mean it
But I mean it
I love it when we talk
When you walk up to me
Just to say something
Because we both know that I would never speak first

And this poem that I wrote for you
Will rot in the back drawer of the internet
Because it will never reach your eyes

We all know that I can't love with the same romance as everyone else
But I love you
Like my best friend
And I know that you will never feel the same way about me

But

Every time I think of you leaving
I understand why poets use the word "heart"
To express endeerment
Because I feel like my heart is a wild animal
Trying to attack my insides

I've heard that's why our ribs are called "cages"

Chapter Text

My heart is so full of love
That I can’t even call it my own

I fell asleep
And I did not intend to wake up
That’s when all perspective changes

That’s when you stare up at the ceiling
And see the sky

That’s when I told the stars all about you

That’s when we sat on the top of the library wall
And watched the dangers of the world
Happen below us
And for that one moment
I was safe