i hate the way men look at me
jesus never had to deal with that

We pray in the garden,
For peace to take the ache away.
We pray in the garden,
For the light of God,
To guide us to better days.
We pray in the garden,
Guardian sanctum of our hope.

Lightning tongue
Brother tree
Strike the dirt
Breaking free

Roots emerge
Like a snake
Snap like cords
Crack the lake

Speak sword-tongue
Cut me loose
Catch me with
Holy noose

Let me not
Plead, "Away"
YHWH God
Lord, please stay

Earthy tongue
Gentle words
Friendship won
Nesting birds

Turn about
Long ago
What's that sound?
I don't know

Dove wing tongue
Remind me
Of all that
Love spoke He

Calm me down
Know my groan
Report back
Glowing stone

Let me speak
Orphan tongue
Granting me
Only lungs
Solely You

like a car crash,
explosions fill
my head

emotional wreckage—
thoughts tangled
in dread

am i the problem?
or are they
projecting
instead?

i let go
of the wheel

just to
feel something—

go off the rails,
’cause sanity
feels surreal.

am i the problem?
or just
trapped in
my head?

because dealing
with this

is harder
than i ever
imagined.

Be encouraged by the challenges you face. It is a huge growth potential right there!

you’re not down,
you’re not
out for the count.

give yourself
some room
to breathe.

i know
they’ve written
you off—

but don’t you
dare give up
now.

they haven’t
seen your best,
only your worst—

and now it’s got
you thinking
nothing

will ever
be good enough.

but none of that
matters now.

what matters
is this:

you hold
the power
to shape your fate.

so don’t you
dare give up
now.

get back up
off the ground—

don’t let them
count you out.

breathe
i           breathe

words separate
the silence

light’s brittle
and intimate ministry

liquid across the wall
looking forward

let us leave
ourselves behind

we      breathe
            breathe

I wish I lacked empathy.
I don’t want to feel.
I don’t want to see signs.
I don’t want to be real.

One minute, I’m fine—
then my soul explodes in my chest.
I wish I didn’t see that.
But I did. And now, no rest.

I wish I could shrug,
say “that’s not my concern,”
but every flicker of pain
Causes my stomach to hurt.

I notice the silence,
the shift in your tone—
there's nothing in your voice
It's all I think about alone.

This is why I'm standoffish and stick to just me
There's no ache in loneliness
At least not the kind that stings

Maybe I'll make friends but that feels like betrayal
These self imposed rules- a safe fortress failure

I wish I didn’t feel
At least not to this extent
My day was going so good
But I ruined it again

Some things are better off dead
Buried in the ground
The memories stuck in my head
Spiraling around and around

My soul sits in its tomb
My hopes are the coffin it lies in
My inner child is the surrounding gloom
My dreams are the flowers lying on the stone

My trauma make up the walls that surround
My pain is the drawings underground
My soul was buried with the shackles that bind me
I had to bury it all so it would let me breathe

You have to stop looking behind to look ahead
That’s why some things are better off dead