she was too young when she sold her voice
in exchange for the sort of happiness
that comes from obedience and conformity.
each step towards her dreams of independence

and unfettered happiness
was taken on a glass-adorned floor,
her family’s kaleidoscope of shattered hopes.
she walked on those tiny knives,
the smile on her face borrowed, not bright.

little songbird dreamed of being herself,
though her bleeding feet paved a scarlet path
for their expectations.
unintentional but titanic chains.
“You are our future,” they promised fiercely,
ravenous, eyes black as their intentions,
“You will be perfect.”
it was her first mountain.
she learned quickly she would
never best it.

she was a daughter of the water.
her eyes gleamed like their sapphire depths, though the rare rain that fell from them
was just as salty.

some days, she wished she had never left their cerulean currents,
innocence left behind, fading bubbles in her wake.
longing ate at her heart like acid.

her sister warned her,
but the siren call was too strong.
little songbird of the sea,
called by the melody of the earth.
spiraling notes of emerald leaves
and opalescent, satin clouds
that the sea does not sing.

and so she ascended from the abyssal black
pearls on her neck cold and bright as winter snow,
hope warm and coral pink on her cheeks.

in the eighteenth winter of my life
I and the songbird of the sea
were one and the same. she was a melody
echoing the first death of my heart. it went gently

or so she tells me.
like a whisper of wind,
though it felt more like
an adder’s kiss.
she held my hand and told me,
“little bird, breathe. we will be okay.”
looked me in the eyes, the dusk in hers,
as I watched the blood.
drops dripping, dropping.

the razor-blade taped to the bottom of the desk
is gone now,
though the girl who burns
remains.