I don't want to hear about your guns,
Quite honestly.

I don't.

I don't want to hear about your second amendment,
Your well-regulated militia,
Your intention to maintain the security of our free state.

I don't want to hear how guns don't **** people,
Or how murderers will always find a way.

I don't want to hear how your right to a gun is more important
Than my students' right to go to school
And come home--
Alive.

I don't want to hear it.

Because I want my students to be safe.
I want to be safe.
I want to feel reasonably assured that there won't be a school shooting in my building,

And right now I'm not.

Because it can be anywhere,
Any time,
Anyone.

It could be your son,
Your daughter.

It could be you,
Who has no more soccer practices to go to,
Or games to watch your child play in,
Or dreams to work towards.

I want to hear about solutions
(and no, I don't want a gun myself, thank you very much).

I want to hear that my student's right--
My student's Declaration of Independence-given,
Inalienable,
Truthfully,
Self-evident
Right to life

Matters more.

Than your Constitutional
Second amendment,
15 years later.

Because it does.

No more.
Never again.
March for your lives.

We're almost touching.
we were walking side by side,
you're talking about cabs in your hometown.
I can feel the gravity of your hand, calling my fingers
whispering "it's alright."

We're touching but not quite.
you held my shoulder to protect me from the passing cars.
and for the first time in a long while, I felt so fragile.
In this world where I find it hard even to breathe,
you believed me.

I almost said it.
All I need is one ounce of strength to tell you every single thing that I have ever felt about you.

I want to find home in your collarbones.
Would you be kind enough to let a stranger in?
I want to seep in your being because I'm cold.
The world is harsh and my cracks are aching.

Almost.

I’ve been seeping constellations for you-
For you to see the colors within me
But i can see the milky way on my bathroom sink
And I’m bleeding all over the broken bottles you left last saturday
And on the empty pill bottles I was prescribed to forget you

When you kissed me last you told me I tasted like a stranger
Even though I’ve showed you every galaxy I hide inside me
All my stars and the spaces in between them
You used to tell me you could see the sky in my eyes
But last time I heard you haven’t checked the weather in months

The stars are sleeping in my veins now,
I started saving them from my bedroom floor
But i can still feel you on my fingertips
I still think of you every time I look at the sky

I’ve been kissing strangers to forget the taste of your lips
But i feel you in the back of my throat every time I smile
I feel you in my voice when someone asks me about my plans for the future
Because my entire life I was told one day I will find my better half
And you always told me you were mine
But who are you to tell me I need someone else to feel whole?