i saw the flag hang limp in the sweat-burned air
the president mumbled through a teleprompter
while the rich ******* clinked their rosé glasses
and the homeless guy outside CVS whispered “revolution.”

i walked through a walmart cathedral of neon death
fluorescent lights buzzed like dying bees.
a woman cried in the diaper aisle,
not enough left on the EBT
and the checkout kid had eyes like war.

everyone’s got a gun now or wants one.
fear is sold in bulk, 2-for-1.
but joy?
joy costs everything you got
plus shipping.

billboards scream GOD LOVES YOU
but only if you vote the right way
& keep your ****** polite
& don’t kneel too long
unless it’s in church or to capitalism.

trump’s face still floats like a blimp in the sky
bloated with lies, smiling like rot
and no one’s coming to save us.
they’re too busy selling hats,
too busy building walls out of fear

america, you jazz-blasted ghost,
you cigarette-burned lover of a dream.
i still drive your highways like rosary beads
but now they lead to nowhere;
just strip malls, gun shops, & graves.

I once tried to become the sky.
Let the wind take what was left of me.
Let my only legacy be:
“The Girl Who Once Flew.”

I once tried to become the sky.
But heaven was heavier than I imagined.
I thought it would make sense—
I hoped the air would catch me,
that it would hold me as someone that meant something.

But gravity had other plans.
I didn’t fly.
I fell.
And I didn’t even realize I was falling until I looked up and saw I was at rock bottom.

Yet there was something grounding about falling.
It was satisfying to know
that I’ve fallen and couldn’t fall any more further.

Instead I laid there.
My legs and arms spread,
still bracing for a concrete I already hit.

I looked up at the clouds with envy.
Not because they floated—
but because they’ll never know what it’s like to fall.

I once tried to become the sky.
But I wrote this instead.
So I’d have something I left behind.

i say my name
out loud
to an unfamiliar room.

i can’t contain
my worn-out lies
burning through the truth.

they don’t flinch,
they’ve heard
this script before.

“the lower i sink,
the further i stray,
the harder i hit the floor.”

but they’re all ears,
offering silent company,
unravelling their past.

survivors of guilt,
hurt and poetry,
society’s outcasts.

our stories stay,
still shining bright
in sheltered wounds,

as i say my name
out loud
to a familiar room.

The morning light is
judgement day.
Like life's lingering memorial to inadequacy,
it is a death determined on slow demise.

Exacerbated exhaustion,
£s pounding your brain and taxing souls.

Bedroom shade, blissful sheets and bold coffee are
barless enclosures,
like spindles
patient for a maiden's finger.

Old woman,
you shuffle past the bus stop,
coat dragging like the years you’ve worn,
eyes clouded,
face soft like pages turned a thousand times
and almost forgotten.

You walk like you’ve been walking
your whole life,
through the noise,
through the quiet,
through the people who left
and the ones who never came.

And me?

I just sit here.
Watching.
Like a ghost who hasn’t even died yet.

Because I don’t think I’ll make it there.
To where you are.
To where your bones ache but
your breath still rises.
To where your silence means survival.

I don’t think I’ll ever grow old.
Not like you.
Not like anyone.

They say ”you’re young, you’ve got time,”
but time feels like a hallway I can’t find the end of.
Like a clock with no hands,
ticking in a room no one else hears.

My days are…
blurry.

Tight in the chest.
Heavy in the head.
Like I’m dragging a life behind me
that I never asked for.
Like I’m underwater
but smiling at everyone above the surface
so they won’t ask
if I’m drowning.

Old woman,
how did you do it?
How did you live long enough
to forget some of the pain?
To bury people,
and still get up to buy bread
and feed birds
and water plants that will outlive you?

I can’t even imagine next week.
Let alone
next decade.
Let alone
wrinkles and soft sweaters
and stories that begin with
”When I was your age..”

I’m scared that I won’t get that far.
And part of me doesn’t care.

Is that awful?

Some days I hope I disappear quietly.
Without the drama.
Without the note.
Just.. a light going out
that no one noticed was flickering.

But you,
you’re still here.
And I don’t know if that’s strength
or just what happens
when you forget how to quit.

Old woman,
you’re not my grandmother.
You’re not anyone I know.
But watching you
makes me ache
for a future I don’t believe belongs to me.

I don’t want pity.
I don’t want advice.
I want to feel something that tells me
I might still be becoming
instead of slowly unraveling.

So I sit here.
And I watch you.
And for a moment,
just a moment
I imagine
that maybe
somehow
I’ll last long enough
to forget how much this hurts.

That maybe one day,
someone will watch me,
and wonder how I made it.

my wounds
are ocean-deep.
caution advised.
even seasoned souls,
spotless and sure,
could easily drown.

Visions of a saint near
that bridge has a name.
The suicide frontier
the method's all the same.
a jump into crashing rocks
head first into oblivion.
Leave behind shoes and socks,
and aspire to be heavenly.

Waves wash away red splashes
before the blood can stain,
a church will have its masses
while many choose the rain.

A return to first opened eyes
Purgatory denounces peace to grave
to the suffering in which we wish to die,
back here all the grief & the shame.