Shadow girl takes the stage
Playing the role of
Open heart like the highway
Ready to bask in the spotlight
Behind the act, she’s more like a landslide
Rugged, full of secrets beyond her years
Her rendition revealing
A crack in the foundation -
The drama in a small child
Off script, forgetting her lines
While screaming to be heard
The audience throws pennies of pity
You did it to yourself, shadow girl
A wise soul in a young heart
No getting around the way you
Linger in the chaos
Smiling and nodding yes
Keeping screaming at bay
Remaining undetectable in the destruction
But living in the shadows is not the insanity
And this crawling under the rubble
Playing dead until the killer flees
Is no performance
She remains there until coaxed into spotlight again
Shadow girl, it's time for your remake
Scream until your throat is raw
The definition of insanity is repeating the suffocation
And expecting a different result
Curtain call:
When a wounded heart pours, it spills
A stage she was willing to die on
But if no one is in the shadows to hear the epilogue of her pain
Does it still make a sound?
Jan 5, 2025
Jan 5, 2025 at 1:58 PM UTC
growing up is realizing all of the moments you weren't acting anything comparable to grown
up from the ashes of your youth
the innocence remains in the form
of more sugar than spice
an elixir, no fountain can change
the way my smile lines begin
to crack like the valley once home
no empty nest syndrome
only learning how to fly before you fall
growing up is realizing all of the times you hadn’t
been taught how to be grown at all
Jan 5, 2025
Jan 5, 2025 at 1:56 PM UTC
Peel flesh away from bone
Spiders crawling in my skin
The Recluse takes over
Pulling me to darkness within
Cobwebs in the corner
Break me, sticks and stone
Like vermin, biting the hand that feeds
Tangled up in web til I’m alone
Dangling in the corner again
I’m not sure that I mind
I’m going invisible, although uncomfortable,
If I numb it, I’ll be fine
For sanity as currency
Giving away my time
I can pull on the mask
But my nerves begin to grind
The Recluse curls around me
Keeps me in an embrace
Comforts me like I’m a child
In the shadows I remain.
Jan 5, 2025
Jan 5, 2025 at 1:40 PM UTC
I used to talk to God about my problems
With no answer from the sky
I used to talk to friends about my problems
Maybe they think I’ve found God as I plead
I used to talk to the Devil about my problems
With no hope for any mercy
I used to talk
I used to have my voice.
I don’t know where it’s gone.
Jan 5, 2025
Jan 5, 2025 at 1:35 PM UTC
Like a sailor’s warning, a red sky in morning,
Ocean swell rolls like thunder from blue to black
The ebb and flow of the crashing tides plead,
“Turn the heat down. We have been trying to put out the flames for so long”.
How long did the fire have to burn
That not even the cries of Mother Earth could tame it?
Only the void of the moon
And the pain from the sun
Misaligned halo in harmony
Could save us from this tribulation
Jan 5, 2025
Jan 5, 2025 at 1:33 PM UTC
I stare at the wall for days
I can’t be clear when I last showered,
But I can tell you what I last ate
When mama says you can’t get up from the kitchen table
But never teaches you to bathe
The kids all laugh at you, teachers send you on your way
I learn eyeliner from grandma, big sister shows me drugs
Boys and fathers ***** my ******* when all I needed was a hug
All attention is good, and any voice I use is bad
Late night internet praying not to be caught by dad
I look over my shoulder,
Paranoid of being framed
A prisoner inside of her own home making straight A grades
Drinking on the weekend, committing petty crime
Smoking all your cigarettes, singing strawberry wine
I sit here in a haze
I can’t be clear what day it is,
But I can tell you when she passed away
Wind beneath my wings at the funeral home,
Where mama says they pray away the pain
But I can’t seem to reconcile any good Lord
Allowing innocence to be stolen on a rainy day
The party-goers all laugh at you, the host just walks away
I learn what a **** is from my cousin, little brother shoves
I’ve built up a wall of pain from all this lack of love
Jan 4, 2025
Jan 4, 2025 at 2:22 AM UTC
dont tell me to smile
I no longer bend
until you break me
the words ring in my ear
im
too loud
too emotional
too outspoken
and over time you
wore me down
stretched me thin
until you could
shape and mold me
pacify me
use me
abuse me
'im sorry'
was the melody
music to your ears
groveling at the need
for you to keep me in your collection
'but don't you love me?
but don't you need me?'
a record i hate on repeat
because you refuse to play
the one where i say no.
instead, you turned the volume down.
not anymore.
i am the screeching halt
to the lullaby you composed
interrupted by screaming, by clawing
by my refusal to let you ruin me
it's not that i no longer sing at all.
its just that i choose to wait
for someone capable of harmony.
Jan 4, 2025
Jan 4, 2025 at 1:57 AM UTC
How many nights will I sit in the echo chamber of my mind?
Telling me I'm unworthy, that I'm running out of time
Time is the measurement of change,
And arrives no sooner than the dearly departed
The drumming in my chest serves as a reminder
That I'm destined to be broken hearted
Glancing in the mirror for a lifetime of bad luck
The fragments of the memories
Lead me to just not give a ****
Fine lines under my eyes grow deeper with each turn around the sun
My sense of hope is fading
When each chapter burns before it's done
There is no other choice but to take paper and pen
To fill in the blanks, find a way to start again
But no matter how many times I aim to change the narrative
The glass in the mirror will shatter
I am trapped here; it's declarative
A mosaic of pain, of all things unkind
I refuse to put it back into the world
Instead I choose to suffer with no one at my side.
This does not make me a martyr, a sinner, or a saint
I am just a girl now turned a woman
Still trapped in her constraints.
Mar 29, 2024
Mar 29, 2024 at 1:17 AM UTC
it's not love.
you will make it out of this.
saying no does not make you a bad person.
saying yes too much will leave you empty.
you probably don't need those credit cards.
whiskey does not drown your sorrow.
this is the only body that you have.
be kind to it
and your heart which
shatters over and over
but still lives.
you will make it out of this
you will fall in love
with yourself and then
maybe one day another.
you will live to see 22 and then 25
and then, eventually, 30.
today, we are 28.
we are happy.
we are grateful.
May 22, 2020
May 22, 2020 at 1:20 AM UTC
"I never stood a chance, did I?"
"That's the sad part - you did once."
I stopped dead in my tracks at that moment. How was it possible that one small sentence could send me through a myriad of emotions, and so quickly at that? Every brittle bone in my body felt like it was threatened to crack by the chill that rolled down my spine and spread to my toes. The voice echoed in my skull, creating a rattling against the cage that was my mind. I could never be free from it.
Immediately, I was taken back to that time where it was you and I. I stood on the corner and you had asked me to stay. I was hesitant, but nothing will ever replace or let me forget that warmth that I felt. It was as if a fire was lit in this hollow chest, keeping me warm and igniting me with a pride that later on betrayal would burn out.
Where did it all go so wrong?
It was that question that I was still unable to answer. You and I - again, we both knew it was undeniable. I had once been powerful. This has once been beautiful. As it seemed, with all good things, they must come to an end.
And here we were.
My arms folded across my chest and I found my fingers curling into my fists. They squeezed, tightening until my bones were knuckle white and taut against my skin, glowing so pale like the moon that lingered over us. My eyes found it after seeking it out, and I struggled not to find myself counting every star in the sky as the letters of the words for all of the things I wanted to say to you. I couldn't seem to find the way to curl my tongue around them and spit them out into your hands anymore, but trust me when I say I once would've given you all of those stars.
I could only manage a few - "Well, the past is the past."
I could hear the disdain crawling from your throat and escaping in the form of a sigh. In this moment to you, the words mattered. Like a board game I found myself with not many letter choices to arrange together, and certainly none that would ever place you & I in the same reality again, regardless of how much I longed for it.
Apr 21, 2020
Apr 21, 2020 at 3:19 AM UTC