whispering words of wisdom, let it be.
let it go, free your hands from your mangled heart, let it heal. in all kindness to yourself, don't go back. you held your breath, even if it hurts to breath again,
it's time to breathe again. lying on the floor in a mess of hungover emotions, so strong you tremble at the mercy of your thoughts. at any moment it could all hit you, you would fall apart in front of all these people you have carefully, manipulatively fed lies of okay-ness. what if it crumbles you? stand back up, because I swear to god if there was one universal truth that I could convince everyone of, it would be, "there is no shame in the truth of emotion." so why am I holding all my feelings and truths like ***** weights? if I believed for myself the things I believe for others, if I just allowed myself to feel the way I accept others do, would I be so messed up? boxed up? maybe if it were for these words, I would explode.
maybe if I went back, changed how I withheld, changed how I gave up, maybe

Oh god

maybe...

There is a recurring guilt instilled in me. I know that it will not ever go away. It will quiet itself with "the past is gone now, nothing can be undone" "you did what you had to" or "don't cry, everyone is mostly okay now"

But then I'm crying myself to sleep with 7 shots as a bedtime story, and I'm listening to all the songs that make my heart hurt and my head numb with nostalgia.

And then I'm doing what I have to do throughout the day - I'm keeping it in and I'm holding on and I'm telling myself it's really gotten better since I last fell apart and I answer my questions with forgetting

Then I'm back in bed. And I'm so close to drifting away from it all but my face is cold and wet because it's winter again and I'm still sad

And then, oh God, I am back four summers ago and I'm wearing my favorite jeans and too many bracelets and I am RUNNING from you. I watch myself leave and I recall every word I put in the goodbye letter and then, I imagine how it destroyed you.. because I ******* promised I would stay

And Jesus Christ I wake up and I know what has happened since and I know that I hurt you when I didn't have to

The ******* guilt is eating me alive again.

I've got a few tethers, each one is stretched. I'm trying so hard to do right.
I've never followed rules, even my own.
It may have been easier alone.
Resistance to give, that's all it is.
But couldn't we just run away from it all and live free,
walk tall and just be?
This is getting a little ******* me..

Every day brings me farther away from the past,
I'm so thankful for that.
For someone who always felt out of place, out of touch,
belonging is a graceful wonder.
I messed up so bad,
went too close to the edge,
walked right up to the end,
turned around.
I got tangled and mangled and strangled.
Then I pried the hands off of my neck
and broke them.
I was belittled and betrayed,
so I stood up and walked away.
I grew taller with every step,
so I didn't dare stop.
Every day further away from the past is a sweet reminder that
it
gets
better.

I went numb for a while, 'cause it was easier than all the questions
and all the depression. But I also think maybe I was numb before that,
probably a little more each day since I lost a bit of myself, and then I lost a lot more.
Life is just too much to let it all in, you know? How is one young soul supposed to absorb it all?
I think we shut it all out and we get selfish, because it is one hundred million times easier to focus on our own silly little problems than to think of those that suffer horrendous crimes, families who starve, or even to think of the brutalities animals face so we can have a dinner we prefer.
What about the lonely people?
How could you live a carefree life if you let in the thought of how many people you've hurt, or how those few hurt you? God, no.
Why would you? It'd be torture. You let that go, even if it takes a while.

But what if you can't? What if it turns out, you aren't like the rest? What if all the sadnesses and tragedies keep you up at night? What if you're 19 and you're pretty sure life is eventually going to be so ******* much that it will inevitably crush you? What if you are scared to death that you operate so differently than other humans, that you won't make the cut?

What if you're shaking and crying in bed at 11:58 pm, after a day of putting in all the effort to act normal
and you are burying yourself in music praying to fall asleep before it all really hits you
and it occurs to you that empathy and worry and fear is going to drive you six feet under?

What will happen?

you call out
"god help us"
in the quietest voice,
and I hear in it a desperation to be heard.
it's the way a mother would die for her child, as if it were no choice at all.
and the same sort of love that it takes
to stand between bullets
and your sister.
it's how a husband will do anything and everything to protect his wife.
it's what matters.
it's the way it should be.
you would lie down your heart to save what it beats for.
and at the the end of the day,
at the end of time,
it will be what saves us all.

I had a dream that I could
Fly out of your reach
And you could never find me
I had a dream I was free
                     You had a dream that I was always in reach and
I would always return to you
And that you were all I knew    

While you were dreaming, I was leaving.
Because this wasn't love,
It was a jail for the worst.
And maybe your dream would've come true,        
If I hadn't woken up first.