A boy and I arrive at the teacher's desk at the same time
There's an awkward flurry as we try to figure out who should get a paper first
But eventually the boy defers to me
"Chivalry isn't dead," the teacher jokes, and the boy laughs with him
I head back to my desk, tongue bitten between my teeth
I seem to have a talent for that
But part of me wants to turn around and tell them
No
Chivalry's been dead for a while now
And I'd answer the question in their eyes with
That was just common, human courtesy

Then again who am I to judge other's intentions?

Still would've been fun to see their faces.

It is true darkness that congregated in the corners of my room that night
And I could not recognize it, only knowing its cousin
Who hovers by streetlights and candles

Deep down, I've always known that the fae dance across my face and talk about me as I fell asleep
I knew what this was, though I did not know enough to fear the messenger
I knew this was a summons
A summons to the moonlight world that shadows the world we know and love

Suddenly, we are far beyond my bedroom
Traipsing through an electric, thorn-filled jungle
My stomach begs loudly of hunger, but it barely registers
With the amount of static sounding in the air
We walk on pathways stripped from the northern lights, pinks and greens, without solid footing
Magnetized forward faster and faster
To destiny

My feet bleed and the true darkness closes behind me, devouring the evidence of my red-stained path

A mist that I had never noticed dissipates
And I see the mushrooms
They glow ghost-white, towering tall as trees
Standing sentinel in a circle, the guardians of such laughter and music as you could never describe-
The music!
It is shattering crystal, raging rivers, and the death song of birds all at once
The darkness pushes me into the circle, and I whirl and twirl to its sound
The erratic beat taking over my heart ryhthm
I throb with its energy, my hands begin emitting their own glow
And the fae begin to take more form around me, in silvers and golds

The music screeches and my heart skips a beat
The circle begins to rumble
Mortal girl comes the echo
My skin feels the kiss of acid rain
You should not have come here
This place is not for the likes of you
A fae with a wreath of thorns adorning its head steps forward
Darkness burning in the sockets where once there may have been eyes

I cannot speak, its stare melting my lips into my face
You have seen too much, you have danced with us
Tell me why I should not hold you here
I look away, desperately trying to gather my thoughts and my voice
The fae would not care about my family, my friends
It would not care about my dreams
The true darkness caresses my hair and I hear its sharp laughter

"I-" I begin

The laughter cuts away, the static dies and my voice hangs in the vaccuum
"I was brought here, by you I presume"
I dare to look the dark fae in the eyes
"I was a dreamer enough to follow"
"You wish to challenge us humans, your endless source of amusement"
"Our torture is your game"
The fae concedes with a thoughtful nod
"But there is no greater torture than to know this place and never come back" I finish
The fae chuckles, as I bite my lip

Clever mortal it mocks
Indeed, go home. I banish you from my lands
May you suffer it adds with a smile

And I am cold
I fall from my bed in a tangle of blankets
In my ear, I hear the wriggling of music
It never quite goes away
The darkness smirks at me from the corners
And I cry softly
For who has ever willingly given up on the fae?
But I hear my sister waking up and I start to smile, despite my sacrifice
For how very few have met the fae and lived?

A shout out to my history teacher who makes the time to teach
for I’ve picked up on the subtext she can’t speak:

if you teach to the test no one’s really being taught
all we learn is to chase empty numbers
and you wonder
why we’re all burnt out
when the end goal isn’t our happiness now

when the very organizations meant to support education
profit off those who have no choice but to turn to them

when the ones who can pay to prep
the ones who work until they can't see straight,
the so called “high achievers”
are the only ones who matter
and we ourselves kick everyone else off the ladder

if standardization is supposed to make education equal
then at the very least it should teach
that we all have a spot,
that in society, we can all be contributing members,
but it’s not.

like my history teacher’s given me,
we need lessons to life rather than to test

it’s time we set a better example for our students
Teach us that even when the blocks have fallen down, we can rebuild the tower

Sometimes you have to take someone by the hand and run by their side, run and run, in circles, if need be-

We are starlings, taking wing together, a silhouette echoing in pieces through the sky-

Run and run, until they find their place
Knowing success only when you let go and they can fly on their own

I was a believer
Long after the other girls got interested in parties and boys

I would sit on my heels on the floor of the school library
And stare at the musty shelves of stories, searching for my next fantasy

I was a true believer
It seemed strange to me that while all of these characters, my friends,
kept finding magic in their worlds
mine was devoid and empty
I kept wondering, Why not me?

I was sure the magic was just hiding from me
Waiting for the right time to show itself
Waiting until I was ready to become the heroine
Every windy night, every walk into the woods,
I would think
This time, it will come for me
But it never did

I had a book on forest faeries and how to find them
After waiting and waiting all of those years
Clinging to my last hope, I decided I would give the magic one more chance
I went out to my back yard
To the perfect faery tree, with all the knots and holes in its trunk
And deep red berries stirring gently with the warm breeze
I stood under it, hands clasped, eyes closed
And waited one last time
Please I begged Please

And that was the day I stopped believing

From then on, I was determined to be a rationalist
An evidence-only type of girl
I switched to kneeling before the science fiction shelves
Followed the inventions of today's great tech scape
It was magic in its own sort of way

But my metaphoric heart has never quite given up on the romance of true magic
It loves it in a tragic, primal sort of way
It wants to make my life into a hero journey of fate and destiny
It wants there to be something more to this world
A something mysterious, a something beautiful
All my head and heart seem to do is contradict

A long time ago, I used to be a believer
But ever since I decided to give up on magic
It seems that magic has refused to set me free.

The clear glass puddles ripple with morning light
The river rushes fast and dizzying under the bridge
And iridescent drops hover from the trees

Somehow, even the air tastes different
Though it is the same school yard air it always is
It tastes adventurous, mysterious
Tastes like a promise that today will be different

It tastes like a place I imagined once
The wind carrying the scent of the story before it starts,
and I remember that even fairy tale characters have history to learn

I stand under the rain and pull the hood from my face
letting it pound into my eyes until it blurs everything I see

The rain, reminding me once again of how to dream

I had to write this in case I die
And they go through my accounts, find my poems
I had to make sure they know that, despite what they read

I could never **** myself

I loved you all too much, I had too many plans
It's just that, I really wanted to sometimes, you know?
I saw too much reality in life
I saw all the endless ways I could die and it scared me

And I'm sorry Mom, that I never told you any of this
It's funny that, in your own way, you knew how this was going to play out
You were always afraid I'd be like Dad, never asking for help when I needed it the most
But I was going to, I swear
I was going to fix this, as soon as I went away to school
I just couldn't have you know this side of me
I loved you too much for that

And to the people who did know this side of me
I'm sorry too
For the moment when they first break the news that
"Rachel's dead"
And you think I really did **** myself and that you couldn't save me
The taste of relief bittersweet on your tongue when they tell you how it really happened

Just know that I wanted to make the world a better place
I never thought I was enough to do that, but I was trying
Every day, I got up and stuck a smile on my face
Even when I was hurting so badly that I wanted to **** myself
I WAS STILL TRYING

So please, all I ask is
Don't console yourself by thinking I'm in a better place
Every day, no matter how much it hurt, I chose life.

And so, on the off chance that I die tomorrow, or the next day or the next, I just had to get this out there.

My choice was always life.
It was always all of you.

With all my love and the final beatings of my heart,
Rachel

I remember the noble days
When the poems I wrote were more
Than just half-disguised attempts to save myself
Too often now, I forget
To remind you that you're beautiful

You are beautiful
You are what makes life worth living

Too often now, I forget that words are meant to be
Out and spoken
And even though each stands alone in its meaning
Like the language that binds them all together,

Not one of us is alone.

A phoenix rises from the ashes only to return again

She has fallen under the arrows of eyes never meant to see
Her final words she whispered in my ear

A thank you for all of the kind words
And an I'm sorry for the things left unsaid and unheard

And then she is gone,
In a blink
They have pulled away a part of my soul

A phoenix returns to the ashes only to rise again*

If you look close enough, you'll see wings sprouting from the dust
But this is the fall of Amethyst Fire

Time cannot catch our corner of the world
Speaking words until our lips are sore
I am smiling in the core of my soul

I'll miss you
Even though we're never truly gone
We'll still be sitting in our chairs
When rose petals fall

To wake up of own volition, surrounded in warmth
        refreshed like when the moon comes around to full shine
               a wolf howl, with two small voices warbling after
Inked veins run across spring-kissed skin
         inked as a flower, ever constant in impermanence and design
All walk lines, and unexpected find common intersection
        in chocolate and popcorn and spider-like boys
               in flags shimmering as mirages tossed to the sky                
One unseen but listening, eyes glistening with your tears
Red carpet ending finally goes to the deserved

Lessons, internalized, suddenly shine in the real world

I forgot my jacket upstairs in the law office that bears my last name on the wall
It's a fancy building, so I need the elevator operator to take me up
'Are you Mr. Maladi's daughter?' he asks
No, actually. I'm Mr. Bradley's daughter
It takes a second before the pieces connect
'I'm so sorry'
He hugs me, teary-eyes
'I loved the man, he was such a good guy,' he nods

It's been over four years

My dad always said to make friends with the people who support a building
He said you never know where they've been
And that too often they're taken for granted, when they're always there when you need them

And today I saw the effects of this
My dad living the way he taught me

I have never been prouder to be his daughter

The lines are spray painted on the field
The track loops back in on itself

We're running for gym class

Look it's a butterfly! I say
It follows me around the circle

My friends barely glance at it
But I see them every time
The orange and black one
the small white ones that chase each other
I see them every time

I can't take my eyes away
Tracing their paths higher and higher
Until finally they wink off into the distance

I've heard that butterflies are the souls of the dead come back to play
I've heard they are a symbol of innocence or of rebirth

But to me,
all they are is free.

We met on Facebook.
At least, I met you.
I read your story.
   We’re a lot alike, you know.
   We both like imagining things from the trash of everyday.
   I too have a bestfriend who I walk to school with,
   a bedroom that I’d never want to leave,
   A face, a body, a mouth, though it may speak a different tongue.
   I want to go to school and grow up happy too.
But you’ve picked up more pieces than I’ve ever had a chance to see fall.
Sacrificed so much for love when too often I’m neglecting to care at all.
I’m not sure I could, but I hope, if the time ever comes, I can be like you.
   You know, at my school, they have us sign a pledge at the beginning of the year.
   It’s a slideshow about anti-bullying that everyone clicks through and forgets.
   But you’ve made me remember.
If a bully is someone who kicks others when they’re down,
then the bureaucracy strangling your hopes is nothing but.
Lashing out in the name of security but really in their own fear,
obscuring the fact that you’re really just like me, just like them,
refusing to recognize the sacrifices you’ve made
and reward your good natured humanity with a place to be happy,
a place to hold as home.
   I took a pledge to not sit silent, and so here’s my voice.
Maybe one day you’ll hear it in person.
Maybe, one day, enough people will stand up that we’ll be able to meet and grow up happy,
      Together.

The darker it gets
the more the words begin to writhe

Writhe and rise

they dance before my eyes
tumbling out of my heartbeat,
the poems
Write themselves.

I’m sitting in the hallway with 3 friends,
4 hungry girls waiting for practice to start.

Another friend comes along with a brown paper bag.
In it, he has 2 donuts- 1 sugar coated and 1 frosted over.
The friend quirks a smile.
“Here, fight for them.”
He throws down the bag and turns away.

I’m closest.
Quick hands, I ****** the prize.
In seconds, the pack begins to howl,
1 begs, 1 reasons and 1 prepares to fight
they all move in to take me down i’m the enemy now they’re about to pounce i shout

“Wait!”

My voice echoes down the hall.
They freeze. They blink.

“2 donuts, right? 4 girls? Split 2 with 4 and we all get ½. That's reasonable, right?”

They sit back on their heels.
Slowly, no sudden movements, I reach into the bag.
We share our ½’s with sheepish smiles.

The friend turns back around and sees us all happily munching away.
“Wait, did you split those evenly?”
He says it with such disdain.

Is it so wrong to want the world to work in a way where everyone wins?

There is nowhere you could go
that I would not be there to support you

A promise is a promise

Even if we're lost, unsure and confused
I promise you will not walk this
Winding trek alone

I'll help you figure it out, you said
*Me too

Everyday on my way home from school
I slip down an untended shortcut where
By the sides of the walkway, the dandelions lie

It’s a fact that the cheeriest yellow will turn to a head of white with time
And so, each day I’m walking by

I snap a stem from it’s spot in the ground
And hold it’s soft flower to my lips
And wish for something I already have

I blow these wishes out into the world
To catch up with me years away from now
I drop the empty stem by a tree
Into a pile of other broken bodies
Each a flower’s memory

I call out to my best friend ahead of me
I run over, grab her hand and pull her along
Pull her along for all those years away from now

I'll pull her along until it’s our time to blow away too
That’s when I’ll know my wish has come true.

Dad's in the ground and
Mom's got a boyfriend.

He's as tall as Dad is short and he likes to bike and ski, two things both Mom and Dad never figured out how to do. I've only met this boyfriend once or twice but you know what?

I don't care. As long as she's happy.

They see each other in between the times Mom spends driving Sis and I around. They've been to the city, to each other's houses and towns. Mom says he talks a lot, but she laughs as she says it.

Mom thinks it's special somehow that he and Dad both had graying hair and blue eyes.
And who am I to say no?
Who am I to reduce affection to statistics and chemicals, chance and electricity?

Mom, you deserve every happy second you feel with this man. I hope you have the best of experiences and adventures ahead. I hope the love in your heart you had for Dad just keeps on giving, lighting up the night sky with the stars.

Dad's dead and
Mom's found happiness again.
The world keeps turning around and so do we.

And so do we.

Look for me
Maybe I've washed away
But I'm still here

Lost in the past
Ghost made of ash
*There's always something more to see

You know those dystopian stories that became popular a few years ago?
Where there's the one government that controls all the people
and they're well past the pitiful divisions of before,
because otherwise the whole Earth's going to be destroyed?
Or it already is and they need each other's cooperation to survive
in the lifeless vacuum we call space?
And yeah, it's dystopian because something's going wrong-
the government is ******* away people's individuality,
it's taking advantage of the people who can't fight back, or something like that-
but I look around at the world I live in today
with all it's death and sadness and sand-drawn lines
and I can't help but think I'd like to be a citizen of those stories instead

An age-old warning haunts me from a fairy tale
*Be careful what you wish for

Every rose has its thorn
Every ocean its undertow
You have yours, but I've been lucky
You let me past those walls
And what I found was a friend for a lifetime

I can't remember the day we met
But that's what makes us ourselves
Because you're here to do that for me

It just seems like I've always known you

I've never looked up to someone as much as I do to you
Your artwork, creativity
Your cool rationale,
Your sassy smirk,
The ability you've manifested to be an adult
Driving, job and school, taking care of yourself

You're by my side to search for what I've lost
Literally, Metaphorically
You see this town in the same light I do
We have the same passion, same plans, same past
Almost

When my demons snake thier limbs out for me, it is you I use as my shield

I think you may even be better at keeping things hidden than I am
Thank everything you let me in
You are beautiful, perfect
You do enough, try hard enough
You don't need to lose weight, you can have whatever makes you happy
If you can't trust anyone else, you can trust me
I'm sticking around

I hope I remember the pirated kids movies, all the hair styles you had to do for me, the hiding in your basement from the heat, the hot chocolate, the lunches sitting on the floor of the hall

But there is one thing I am certain I will never forget and that is you being you Aqua
Thank you for being the winter to my spring
Thank you for being a forever friend

Thank you for being you

The three of us drag our feet across the snowy field
I bet you he's laughing right now Mom insists
I mean, we know we're in the right place
This spot is burned into each of our minds
But we can't find him
I use my shoes to scuff the snow off one plaque,
then another
My toes going numb and cold
Baring the grass to the frigid air
But to no avail
The three of us laugh because there is nothing else to do
There's homework and after school activities to complete
We can't stay combing the ground back and forth all day
We say our I love you's and goodbye's
And walk away, leaving only a trail of footprints behind

Today, I lost my dad's grave underneath the snow

It didn't hurt, I left it there that way
Life carried on

Right now,
it smells like old, crumbling stories
from the bookshelves out in the hall
there's a Barbie cup on the desk where I sit
cradling pens that for years have gone unnoticed and unused
I'm surrounded by photos
of young people now old and old people now dead,
and across from me is that faulty router
that brought me up here in the first place

Sometimes there is nothing to write beyond the ordinary
no beauty to behold, no story to be told
and all that is left to capture is
life as it is
before it fades a  w   a    y

I curl my knees, drop my head to my chest, my phone cupped carefully to my heart
Its buzz is now the lifeblood vibrating through my veins

*You're still here

You brave, brave souls
Staking your ground with your banners
Defiant, your words claim
This is my story
Who I am
And no one, and nothing will take that away from me

How I wish I could be like you.

I use my hair as a paintbrush to place raindrops on my palm
In the harsh light of the desk lamp,
They shimmer, on fire
Like the trees outside the door
I wipe the water on a towel
But the glow doesn't fade
Until my hands are staid.

If you stay still, silent and out of the way,
People will walk by without even knowing you're there.

How many things do you miss as you live your life?

Out of corners that look empty and corridors that blend together
The truth will appear

Blink your eyes open

I'm waiting there.

I'll always be here for you

I can't breathe.*
It seems,

We are all just a gathering of cells
Splitting ourselves in half
And in the process, losing ourselves
Dreading the day when something finally goes wrong
With the aging of our vigilance
We finally become
Cancer.

Even the words have dissipated, running down my checks like the last few raindrops of a forgotten hurricane

Ask me
I dare you
Don't you care to know my heart?
When I'm gone,
Won't you wish you had?
My hand outstretched,
I will show you where mirages are born
Where rainbows- the sky's greatest lies- begin
All you have to do is just cross the river, jump the stepping stones
Never mind how slippery they may be
Don't you trust me?

*Ask and you'll recieve

Waves of music extend their roots, tingling throughout my brain
On repeat, on repeat
On repeat
They have faded
To the point where the words no longer have sound
Yet my mouth still knows their shape and meter
As if they are my own, from buried deep in my soul
And who knows?
Maybe these words have interwoven themselves into the fabric of who I am
Binding me with the others they've swept away
Pulling me deeper into the glowing furnace of human warmth
All for the price of a listen
And I hear something more than music

In laughter and static, the world flows past my ears
and I hear the promise of being something greater than what we are.

It's always been strange for me
when the car in front of mine slows,
blinker on in the middle of an otherwise still street,
And I watch it turn off into a driveway

I am overcome by a rush of nostalgia
as I realize that, for that one car, for those people,
the house connected to that driveway, that I haven't even taken the time to look at,
To them, that house is home.

We're doing an assignment in my English class right now
We're supposed to write letters to the government
Short, three sentence notes really
And tell them do something! on a topic that matters to you

Let me tell you
Peer pressure is a powerful things
They made a joke of it

And I-
I am no influencer
I caught my tongue between my teeth
And let them get away with

Apathy

Who knew that crayons were smarter than the rest of us?

It seems that adulthood means
Spending a disproportionate amount of time
Calling some big company that doesn't care
If you have more important things to do

You're always on hold.

So this is what it feels like to be powerful
To have brought forth something from nothing
To celebrate other's accomplishments
And to recieve respect tenfold for
All that you've given

So this is what it feels like to reach the end of the journey
To be surrounded by familiar faces one last time
To watch the future stand up and take your place
A candle once lit is blown out

So this is what it feels like to be released from the chains on your tears
To memorize a moment and burn it to your heart

This is what it feels like to be powerful
And you know what?

It feels a lot like love.

What would you give up for something you saw in a dream? Would you give up everything? Would you chase it until you had nothing left, without even really knowing what you were looking for?
There’s a reason for being here, and you’re not going to like it. Stop looking. Some things are better off unknown. You can’t change it, you can’t fight it.
For your own good, keep your eyes closed.

Sitting with my laptop on top of the blanket, hot against my legs
I feel like a writer
The ideas burning quickly through my mind
Characters, conversations conjured

Why do I always do this?
Abandoning yet another half-finished story, its characters crying for an ending
But a new story calls louder
This time, I'll finish it
Take four

For forty-five minutes today, I refused to look at my phone.

That's an accomplishment by the way, my phone is new,
shiny rose gold, with a fingerprint scanner and a high res camera
sometimes I find my fingers just playing with the screen
a familiar caress to calm my breathing and lull me to a sense of dulled security
I cheated a few times, I looked when my mom texted me
saying she'd be another fifteen minutes late, and another

But other than that, I wouldn't look
I looked at the people instead, the trees, the cars
Sitting under the pink awning of some random storefront
I challenged myself to look the sidewalk goers in the eyes
and smile

Some smiled back, there were some awkward how are you exchanges
with people I've never met, some glazed their eyes over and pretended not to see

I saw the most unhappy looking women get into her blue car with her bags from the pharmacy
I watched a older man sit in a spot on his tablet, listening to the radio
I wondered if he was just having time to enjoy himself when his wife came out of the store and the started arguing, good-naturedly
'What else do we have to do?' 'I don't know' 'Do you want to walk around?' 'God no, I hate this town'
Me too sometimes, me too

Everyone here is in a rush
It is a grab-everything-in-sight town
A material, self-centered town, with prices that pay for it
It's odd for a girl my age to stop, slow down and watch people
To smile for the almost-spring breeze, for the cute siblings across the street bundled into matching winter coats
To smile for the sake of smiling

My cheeks burned self-conscious with the thought of how I must appear to everyone
I touch the phone in my pocket
then push it further into the lining of my coat, along with the fear of being me

For forty-five minutes today, I lived authentically

Sometimes the writer inside puts too much faith in the words themselves,
their black and white march in file,
It forgets that adventure cannot be held to contract
and stories have a way of becoming more than just what's on the page

where there is a war, there is a story
and it is a twisted one, the way all real stories are
one I've yet to figure out

Counterintuitive,
the Mad Hatter was good and the Queen was bad
but Alice chose neither
to leave them all behind
to go back to the endless grey of growing up

I couldn't imagine a choice more wrong
than the choice to escape before she'd even tried to
understand Wonderland

Alice, dear, you can't outrun your own head
It is time to choose sides
Make an alliance,
It is time to stay and fight.

Sometimes the world works out in ways we don't understand
And maybe its hindsight or a shift in perception
Or maybe its really looking out for us

But tonight the world took something from me
A simple key
and now I realized it gave me something better

A night to laugh into delirium with a friend
A genuine burst of happiness

Its a give and take
The cogs of the clock keep turning so the world may wake up on time