i glance out of car windows

sometimes into people’s eyes

don’t we all?

stares that were felt but left unreturned

words heard

answered with a smile and left behind

in the wake of quick fading footsteps

and often I wonder

if I’ve missed what I’m looking for

or if something else worth finding

was ignored

and with every bad decision

that i seem to have made

i pray for my soul

i don’t want to be alone

and sometimes the air feels different

and i look around

i look around

i look around

she had a lot of things to say

but no one to say them to



so she kept them in paper stars

in rolled-up pieces of paper

in notebooks with pressed flowers



she planted them with every tree she touched

the songs she sung that the wind stole



once she even scribbled on a wall



she wrote on herself

in ballpoint pen

in razor blades or scissors

            

no one heard her words

like

no one heard her tears

and

no one heard her fall

Hide me from the light; it hurts

Open up your heart and keep me there

Make your eyes my only mirror

And my soul, repair

And one night, she watched as her little cousin played with toy trains -- and she thought of this, and all the things she would miss, the regrets that would come after death if they could.

Her foot lands wobbly; shook before the last step. One tear fell, as she looked ahead, into blackness... And that tear was everything she ever loved, all the voices that told her to stop, all the reasons why she couldn't.

Then she fell, and was gone.

It's hard to be good at life, even if we try. Sometimes, the ladder you're standing on falls, and sometimes, you're not only fallen but broken. When you scream in pain and find you're alone. Life does that. Even if we try.

Too often people whose eyes and hearts and souls are vacant try to empty us likewise.

We look out the window to find we missed the sunset. And instead, gray skies unfold sadly, sad but screaming of coming rain.

When screaming causes you pain yet still the volume is turned up. Your shoulders keep getting bumped. When you're in a slump, you get kicks instead of a lift. And fall down Alice's rabbithole. Or not. Where you land is no wonderland.

See. Even if we try, and the only bad we do is cry, the only harm we cause is to ourselves, it seems there are more lessons for us to learn, more ways we can get burned. It seems, we haven't been thoroughly hurt.

I'm still looking for reasons; though in me is all the evidence, that the world has a grudge against humans. What is so wrong about us...?

That girl who smiles, taking the hand of the old lady beside her, they are both dying -- she, of cancer. A man with a woman with cheekbones and crudely cut hair, towing three laughing kids in a wheeled wooden cart. The young lady who only wanted to go after her dreams -- who was full of potential, is now just full of unshed tears and broken pieces, the faded light that was hope; who should have been a star, prays to burn in hell or whatever's waiting.

But I know that she is beautiful. I know that his heart is as big as the world. I know that she cares, that she dares, that she's brave.

I used to think we were made of the galaxy, but it is cold, unrelenting, and, we couldn't be farther from that. We are suffering. But our tears are diamonds, our sweat – liquid gold, our blood - something greater than the universe. And our hearts our hearts our hearts! It is the mother of everything for which there are no words.

And while I question practically everything (the beauty of life, the wisdom of kings), I have never doubted the pure wonder of the human soul. While I don't know that it gets better, I know that we deserve better. Let's make it so that prayers work again, that there are such things as friends. No more backbites or fistfights, no more rejection, insecurity, glossy eyes that hold back waterfalls. May the rainbows be hope instead of lies. And when you're down, a helping hand instead of a kick to the side. Let's do what we can, so that no one might ever again so truthfully wish their life to end. Care. Help. Love. You shouldn't wait to enter heaven if you haven't tried to bring it down to earth.