AVA:** drinking sriracha so that i can feel something
GRACE: *** how'd it go
AVA: not well
GRACE: *** ava u liar u r practically a genius
AVA: that's hilarious
AVA: sayS THE GIRL IN GENIUS MATH
GRACE: wish you were here
AVA: what???
GRACE: nvm, ignore me
GRACE: wrong person

GRACE: i'm sure ur test went fine

I WANT TO BE REMEMBERED. i want my name to echo through the ages, ringing into the ground. i want my image memorialized in someone’s eyes. i want sinking ships named after me, my name whispered as some prayer to the past.

and if that means i have to destroy the world:
so be it.

we were born for greatness.

let us ride this out,
take this town for ourselves.
let us chain smoke on the rooftops
and drink in the alleys.

let us shout the iliad
at the top of our lungs
to those who will not listen
and those who will not care.

let us travel the globe
in the name of life.
let us dance in korea, brazil, italy,
and return better than before.

let us learn of language,
of the universe inside us,
of people long dead
and of people still living.

we were born for greatness.
let us be great.

the moon knows.

she has seen countless confessions in her light, watched life and death alike, and judged none of it. the moon is the one who will not whisper your secrets to the stars. she is just a reflection, after all. limited by her existence.

the sun is the one who will betray you, will turn his back on you, will scream everything you've done to everyone awake to hear. the sun shines and does not care if you burn beneath him.

the moon does not care, either, but she is not vindictive, and for that, we tell her things the sun will never know.

didn't anyone tell you that the moon can keep a secret?

she is not the sun.

if i tore away my human skin
would you see stars beneath?

if i stitched myself back together
would you find gossamer galaxies?

they say history is written by the victors,
but the conquered are the ones romanticized.

i want to be remembered.
i want our love to sing through the ages
echoed louder than any battle, any war.

i want our enemies’ grandchildren
to liken themselves to our passion,
our desire, our madness.
i want to be the next scarlet letter
and i will waste away in moonlight
if someone remembers me for it.

if history is written by the victors
then i don’t want to win.

i lived on prayers and bon jovi
screaming only the good die young
at the top of my four-year-old lungs

my address is on 8th road north
but i was always more at home
where the streets have no name

i still remember september 11 2001
when my father turned off his radio
i called it the day the music died
and learned to dance with myself

now i sign my love letters with
"yours", "wish you were here", and
"don't let the sun go down on me"

(i think it's gonna be a long, long time
before i forget you and the music
you made me hear)

i can't breathe.
my lungs are filled with
your words,
your hands,
your skin.

i'm drowning.
i'm suffocating.
but with every breath
i don't take,
i feel.

(you bring me alive.
it's funny 'cause
you're killing me.)

i met you exactly once.
i was five and you were tall
and you'd brought me some toy
(stereotypically girly).
i've never played with dolls
and you apologized for assuming.
a week later
you sent me some legos.

i've seen you exactly twice.
the first, i barely remember.
the second i recall all too well
because my parents were crying
but my cousin,
your son,
wasn't.

i find myself wishing i'd kept the **** doll
because the legos you got me
were mixed with the others
a long time ago.

sometimes i wish i were a poet,
if only so that i could tell you
the impossible with words.

i'm getting tired of waiting on you.

and i'm starting to think
that you're getting tired, too.

my ribs must be made of diamond.
how else could they keep my heart from getting to you?

the night they wed,
cinderella slits the prince’s throat.
she won’t trade her prison
for a pretty cage.

the beast conquers nations,
but beauty’s the one telling him how.

aurora wakes herself.
she’ll spend centuries guarding
a city that never stirs,
and she never questions
her duty to people long gone.

rapunzel burns the tower.
ariel rules the sea.