where do you go
when you shrink yourself
so small?

sometimes i imagine
when you shrink
into this fragile thing,
in some far away place
the pieces of your self you hid
are growing exponentially,
a garden in full bloom.

someday i’ll be too busy to notice the vampires
the sun wakes me up and i know who i am
maybe the chaos will always be there but
i’ll find a way to break it down into mulch and grow
pears and herbs and gardenias from what’s left of me
it takes a while to accept that the shadows matter
and i can’t pretend to know the watermelon lollipop
without the tongue that exists only to melt it away
to turn it into nothing until all that’s left is a paper stick
it might feel like freedom now but it can’t forever
i’ll pull down the curtains and never snooze an alarm again
the worst thing i can think of is writing the same poem
each day for the rest of my life and everyone knowing it
but me