As we sit down to our dinners,
as we open our romance books,
people die.

We sip our water;
their guts spill open.
We study our notes;
their planes crash.

We live;
they die.
We breathe;
they suffocate.

We are testaments to chance,
to luck, to possibility.

We are not products of God.

We are blind goats trotting on our path
before we perish, suddenly,
and vanish into death.

He doesn't burn photographs
He doesn't join therapy sessions
He doesn't smoke too many cigarettes
Nor he drown himself into alcohol
He scratches his wounds daily
And never let them heal
He doesn't try to get rid of the pain
Instead he let it grow on him
He waters the seed of sorrow with his tears
He feeds it with the manure of old memories
He takes it to sleep with him
And nurtures it in himself
Till the moment when every single drop of his blood gets replaced by this pain
Until his fragile heart can bear no more
And his soul starts overflowing with emotions
That's when he dip his pen into this pain
And empty his heart on a piece of paper
He bares his soul for us to feel
He creates poetry that the world would cherish for centuries to come

Themes of my former self are beginning to arouse my brain yet again.
States of dark discomfort are starting to show themselves as beacons of light in this strange season.
Possibly to save me from an emptiness much worse than their own,
Or possibly because it is the price I must pay for trying to rid them from my mind like the body does toxins.

I feel their cold nails ripping into my head,
Running a frozen drip down my spine.
They feast on my self-esteem,
And leave a haze on my judgment.
The days consist of fear and emotional turmoil,
At night, I only hope to make it to the next day.

I find it incredibly horrifying to say,
but I am not entirely resistant to this chaos.
Once they arise, I voluntarily retreat into their catacombs.
They act as a guide through the months of frozen life and tell me I must feel their pain,
That it is wrong for me to feel anything else.
Am I weak for succumbing to the torture they force upon me?
Is it insane to find small comforts in their twisted reality?

Surely, my dear friends, I know the answers.
I beg of you please, do not worry about my safety.
Come the days that thaw my bones,
I will be free once again.
I will have survived, as I always have before.

Tears grow heavy as you watch all that you once were begin to rust away.
You do not feel sadness,
but nostalgia,
as clouds containing past lives and past loves circle the space around your head,
Screaming in your ears.
However, you know that becoming a new bundle of energy and knowledge is a great expedition you must embark on by your lonesome, without distraction of any sort.

Those dust-covered shoes struggle to comply at first,
But without any other hesitation,
you set off towards a door that has now made itself known.
With a hand pushing through,
you turn to look at the carcass of twisted memories and,
not knowing if this is directed towards yourself or maybe something bigger than that,
you ask aloud,
"please, tell me before I go, who was this one? This time around, who was I?"

I want my love for myself
To overflow
And I want my overflow of love
To seep over onto you
But for now
My cup is empty
And maybe you can sense
That I have nothing to offer you

How can emptiness be so heavy?