I come from a broken family.

My mom and dad met when they were in college and had me. Things didn't really work out between them so they never got married. My dad went off and met a woman he eventually married and my mom reconnected with an ex-boyfriend she had while she was working abroad and got married too.

Now I've got half-siblings, an older sister, a younger brother and a precious little baby girl born when I was 18. See, I never really connected with my older sister, she grew up with her dad and just had short vacations with us. For the longest time, it was just me and my brother against the world but lately, I feel like I don't even know him any longer.

So, yeah. It's just me.

Don't get me wrong, I like being alone. The quiet and the solitude is something I appreciate. But I'd be lying if I said that I don't ever feel lonely. Growing up, I had to mature early because I was technically the oldest and just like any other Asian households, that meant I get to bear responsibilities. Yay! Not.

I never got to experience what it was like to just be a child. It was always, "I'm preparing you for when you get older" or "You need to learn this now so you can survive adulthood". The funny thing was, from that point forward up until today, that's all I've ever done.

Survive.

I feel like I haven't really lived yet.

There are a lot of things in my life that I rushed because I felt mature. I felt like I was ready to take things on but apparently I wasn't.

I regret a lot of things.

Wish I never did this or never said that. Should've done this instead of that and so many other things that no matter how hard I dwell on, I can't really change anymore. So, everything just takes a backseat because heaven forbid I ******* talk about my thoughts and feelings with my family, right?

I don't really trust the adults around me, even when I was a kid. I always thought that they're just waiting for me to **** things up so they can scold me. I mean, I guess I trust them to a certain extent like feeding me and giving me a roof over my head, that type of thing, but never really anything beyond that. I learned never to expect because I just get heartbroken every time.

Imagine a child getting disappointed all the time she hoped someone would care and listen? That does something to you.

I'm aware that there are lots of things wrong about me. Mentally and otherwise. I'm functional, yes, but there's just this weight I can't ever seem to push aside no matter how hard I try not to think about it.

It's there, lingering.

Festering.

Brewing inside me like a storm that's about to bring the house down if I don't do something, anything, to contain it.

I always have to watch myself, hide myself away because I'm scared that once people see how broken I am, they'd feel disgusted just like how I feel disgusted about myself. The shame, it's always there. For what, I don't even know and I don't know if I want to.

Normally, I'd talk to a friend or someone willing to hear me ***** about things that bother me or if I just want to rant and avoid bottling my feelings up, cause history knows that never ends up well. But this? This is a part of me that I keep locked away and I'm not really ready for everything to come out in the open.

So this would have to do for now.

This should have to do for now.

❝ while he runs from darkness
  she purposefully turns off her light
  he saves her flicker and makes it burn

  like a california fire guided by his wind
  she spreads through the mainland
  curving through the hidden crevices of the world
  her scorching heat;
  felt and seen and adored

  as he runs from the darkness,
  her light continues to burn a fire blue
  the shadows slowly melt away from her touch
  and he feels her warmth and basks in it

  she thought she has saved him from the monsters
  she thought she has saved him enough to stop running

  but the shadows crept back in
  slowly, until it consumed him entirely
  and off the ledge he went

  her savior,
  reduced to nothing but a pool of dusk
  and emptiness
  and sadness

  she was but a flicker but he preserved her
  a flicker which continued to burn in her heart

  so she savored the beauty of his grey tones;
  found and accepted his darkness
  in all the bright places ❞

❝ a bright light you once were
   filled with the radiance of your raging red;

   you illuminated through a flowering future
   but then the dark clouds sought you out
   and rendered your light invisible

   the land roared for your pastel orange of peace
   but the darkness has swallowed everything

   your sons and daughters walked blindly,
   trapped and lost within the dark woods of chaos
   they sought out for you and your warmth
   only to be greeted by the harsh cold
   and blood curdling gargles

   eventually the clouds rolled away and left you tainted
   but as you struggle to reclaim your lost kindle
   we bask in your greyish faint light
   and hope that your waltz to the symphony of change
   will soon take you to the path of a glorious self recreation ❞

❝ a man curses his self-created hell;
   a trap he weaved for himself
   that later on evolved
   into a labyrinth of intricate design

   his choices,
   the basis of his sorrow
   a product of ignorance
   that drowns him
   in the ocean of confusion

   he becomes lost
   in the prison of darkness
   floating in the sea
   of perpetual gloom

   searching for the light
   with eyes open
   but senses shut
   stumbling about for eons
   and eons

   blaming fate,
   God,
   circumstances,
   but never himself ❞

❝ i am a dead tree
   that kids fill with carvings of 'i hate yous'

   sticky webs of old lies and deception
   clings around my withered branches
   that sit dead and blind my sight

   my roots are watered
   by polluted streams while
   acid rain runs through my veins
   like a fracking well with oily leaks  
   that causes me to choke
   and cough up bad blood

   angry winds pass though me
   and i stand engulfed with stillness
   for i am afraid the slightest of movement
   may cause me my demise

   i remember the days
   when i was but a young tree

   i provided home for the birds
   and shade for the people
   to protect them from the sun's raging heat
   but now i am useless
   and hated
   and left alone

   but lo and behold
   i see my farmer striding towards me
   with an axe in his hands to chop me down

   he delivered blows to my body
   that led me into bits and pieces
   to be thrown in the fire

   i smiled and thought;
   at least i was still of use for warmth
   during the cruelty of cold days

   but as i fell from once my might
   i had glimpsed on a little green
   a sapling growing from the earth
   reaching upon the skies

   in this i had learned
   life and death go hand in hand
   that from ashes unto ashes
   and to dust we must return

   but alas it is not the end
   as for the end signals a new beginning
   and as so does chances of a new life ❞