I lay myself in the road
Waiting for either oncoming traffic
Or finally, finally
                   FINALLY
Someone to come along
Pick up my broken pieces
And carry me to safety.
But I am not the child
Easily excused of tantrums,
Forgiven for irrational behavior.
Somehow I’ve become an adult
And expectations weigh on me
To know how to cross this street
All on my own, all by myself.

I have a dream
Of a home on a hill
With a meadow
and a stream
Flowers dotting countryside
A breeze blowing gently
Through the trees
As long as my eyes are closed
I can still believe
But hope is a four letter word
And sometimes truth is
Nothing but deceit
I have a nightmare
Of a house on a hill
With a blazing fire
And nothing but smoke in the air
I’m running through tall grass
Suddenly turned to sharp, sharp glass
Bullets made of rage and lies
Mortar shells and mines exploding
Rocking the ground beneath my feet
I reach the trees and finally rest
Barely breathing, barely being
But finally seeing, eyes wide open
I have a dream of a home
That now I know, I’ve never seen.

Frigid fingers running down my spine
Wrapping around and squeezing my lungs
Coating me in thick layers of ice.
I'm forcing my feet flat on the ground,
Gripping onto the present so tightly
My knuckles turn an ugly shade of bone white.
Eyes darting, landing on things
In the now, hoping to not get lost
In hidden movies that attack me from the shadows
Mental VHS tapes that replay in high definition
Making me doubt my sanity.
Terror running so deep that I reach for blades
To carve not just into my skin
But my very own identity.
Chopping off chunks to store the flash flood
Without drowning in the swamp.
This saving grace rapidly turning
Into the one and only thing, I may not survive.
Shards, past broken off come back
So brittle and sharp they threaten to pierce
My heart at the slightest wrong move.
I have lived through one war only to enter another
That seems to have higher stakes.
Panic freezes my veins and leaves
Beads of cold sweat on my flesh.
I am paralyzed and frigid.
Gasping for each and every breath.

I have to keep pushing forward
Fighting each battle
I forget why I’m here
I can’t remember what exists
Past all the pain and the fear
I don’t have time to rest
I can’t afford the luxury of breath
I’m engaged in a war
Where sides simply don’t matter
You’d never expect it of me
Spending all my time on the frontlines
I’m bleeding, bruised, and broken
Somehow I’ve been shattered
Thousands of the sharpest pieces
Self-created weapon set on attack
Like my own cold war missile crisis
I’m just trying to create myself
How can this agony have meaning
The loss of my innocence
Destruction of my very being
I’m less of a person each time and it aches
This is the price I pay for staying alive
On a battlefield made of childhood
All I know is how to keep moving
One small footstep in front of the other

It's as if
I've stepped
Out of the valley
of a mountain
but instead of
seeing hopeless
forever journey
my eyes light
upon the glint
of the sun
the winding twisting
pathways, which are many
I can see the tricky
dangerous leaps
and the stretches
of peaceful flowers
rocks crusted in ice
and cliffs laced in ivy
but most of all
the beauty from
all the pain
and a life
not spent in death.

If I could
I'd run away
from being me
I'd let this
endless journey go
to finally be free
but I am reminded
that every path
has it's burdens
to flee is pointless
you can not escape
the pain that is
to be alive.

Death, a bittersweet ending
So tempting in it's finality
the release, the numbness
suffocating me, causing me
to romanticize horrors
the opening
of my very own veins
pouring out
every single drop
of my ebony red life.