I inhale
All the words and the pages.
I consume
All the plots and the ink.
I require
The letters and spaces
Like oxygen that I need to breathe.
I exhale
My thoughts onto paper
So that they won’t ever die.
I release
My viscera into the water:
My soul caught up in each line.

I’ll be a seashell
Floating in the time of your tide.
Take me to places
I’ve never been.
I don’t care—
I’ll follow your waves.
I don’t have a direction,
Destination,
Home.
So grind me
Down
Down
Down
Pieces of me
Turned into sand.
I don’t care—
Toss me in your waters.

Lift me up
And let me fall.

𝒓𝒊𝒔𝒆 𝒄𝒓𝒂𝒔𝒉 𝒓𝒊𝒔𝒆 𝒄𝒓𝒂𝒔𝒉 𝒓𝒊𝒔𝒆 𝒄𝒓𝒂𝒔𝒉

Not worth the climb
Unless you’re scared of the fall.
Not worth the love
If you can lose it.
It doesn’t matter one bit
Because if you care at all
Deep down,
You must always choose it.

If you won’t miss
The one you adore
It’s limerence,
Infatuation,
Lust, not love.
If you can let it all slide
Between your fingers like sand
If there’s no ache when you say goodbye:

What’s it worth?
It’s not worth a dime, no time.
What’s it worth?
Nothing at all.
If it’s worth
Even a bit of your heart
Then it must leave a hole when it’s gone.

Your arm brushes
Against mine and a
Warmth slips between
Your fingers and
Shivers down my spine, I
Wonder if you’ve got any idea,
The effect you have on me.
I wonder if you realize
That you’re a living dream.

I can’t breathe,
Pressed down by the weight
Of meticulously staying
The same.

It’s a hammer
Coming down on me
It never stops.
A cycle, it never stops.

How can you stand it?
The mindless mundanity
Dragging us down in
A haze, eyes wide open.

“Hello, old friend.”
The lines in his face
are streams of white sand
Falling through the hourglass.
“It’s been a while.”
He says to me
But we both know
That he never left.
We walk together
On the worn path.
He holds my hand
Not in comfort,
But to drag me forward.
He’s a swift current.
He’s a companion,
Traveling by my side.
He’s an ocean,
The eternal and endless tide.

As I breathe out, you breathe in.
As I breathe in, you exhale
And I watch as the breeze
Sweeps past me,
Tickling my face and
Ruffling my hair like
A loving father.
You’ve watched me grow
Watched as I cried and you thundered
A cacophony of sobbing
And shared rivulets
Of trickling water.
You’ve watched as my heart
Grew colder while winter
Crept in like a chill burrows
Inside your bones.
Skeletal trees littered the streets.
But then,
But then you watched my eyes light up
In wonder of the snow drifting
Down, a gentle blanket resting
On the dead like a peaceful burial.
A solemn rest.
And when the sun held
On to the day like a lover
Reluctant to let go.
When the buds grew again
And the world woke up
From its enchanted sleep,
You watched me, you watched
As I stretched my arms
To meet the sky.
You watched me stand
Just tall enough
To graze the clouds.