you will die this way.

trying to handle all of this mess,
trying to keep it all even though it is too heavy to hold.

it will seep into your soul
until it becomes too much to deal with.

it will bleed
and smear red onto the walls.

and you try to clean but
really you are just pushing it
further into the crevasses.

and you try to organise
but really you are just moving things around.
moving them into their new graves, to gather dust and to rot.

and even though you have hidden it,
it is still there,
the decay is still happening.

the mess it still
buried and decomposing
behind a curtain.

you need to cull, and burn.
throw out and throw up all of the things you are carrying.
rid yourself of the weight you hold so tightly onto.

let it go,
set it aflame,
laugh at its ashes as they settle into the fabric of the curtain.

you don’t deserve to be confined to a life
carrying it all.

it is not your job to carry the universe,
you are not atlas,
you can put it down.

i promise the world will not end.

i’m preparing for a funeral that isn’t meant to happen yet.

i dig a grave
and carve a stone.

i’m not dead yet.
but i feel like i am dying.

it will save them doing this
when i am gone.

it is easier to prepare for a funeral that hasn’t happened yet.
than one you didn’t think you’d have to prepare for at all.

why does nothing feel real,
until it happens?

am i that sceptical of good things happening,
that i convince myself they won't,
until they do?

i don't believe it will happen
till i am there
experiencing it.

and even then,
it all feels like a dream.

or something on the edge of a memory,
something i can't quite hold and live in.

like the concert i was sure i wouldn't get tickets to,
or the holiday i thought i wouldn’t get to take.
or next year.
or tomorrow.

how can i live in the moment,
when the moment doesn't even feel real?

i won't ever give you half of me,
or any portion other than the whole.

i will tell you everything,
all in the same breath.

i am sorry
i can not separate myself
into bite-sized pieces.

but it is not my fault
that you never learned
to chew.

anger has always been a strand in my DNA.
i inherited this from my father.

it lives buried deep in my chest.
i feel it slightly when i breathe.

a constant throb,
a pit, inside my lungs.

i feel this rage so deeply,
i am used to its presence.

i do not know what it would be like to live without it.
to breathe without it.

life moves,
and people leave.

my skin will stretch
and my mind will learn.

and maybe it takes time,

but maybe i don’t want to wait,
maybe i don’t have time to waste.

i often think
i am not meant to be human.

like i am made for somewhere
other than earth.

maybe i am a being,
made of stars,
but sentenced to life on earth.

i wonder
if i am
a speck of stardust
looking
for a way home.