You say my grades don’t matter.
You say, “I love you no matter what.”
Then why am I invisible?
Why do they only see the red numbers on my sheet?

You ask me, “Is everything fine?”
What do you expect me to say —
that I’m f**d up?
That I dream about leaving?
That I keep a blade in my front pocket?

You say I don’t share,
but you don’t pay attention.
I play the piano till my fingers bleed,
I scream songs that reflect me,
I even talked to you.

Maybe it’s because you liked me,
never loved me.
Maybe I’m so flawed I can’t see,
or maybe it’s both.
Maybe we’re both flawed —
we’re only human.

I’ve been waiting my whole life.
Waiting for the next day, next month, next year.
Essentially I’ve been waiting for my death, my very own due date.
Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Tock.
And suddenly the day has come.
And they’re knocking at your door.
And maybe they don’t have horns.
And maybe they aren’t wearing the cloak of a renowned deity.
Maybe they aren’t exactly horrible to look at.
Maybe they’re beautiful, pleasant.
And they welcome you with open arms.

Happy families, smiling,
enjoying time together,
atmosphere filled with their laughter.

And then -

in a moment of madness,
all silenced.

Bullets took over,
dead bodies lying all around.

Terror strikes the land
we call "Paradise on Earth."

I am that of a kicked puppy— bashed over the head many times,
before I come crawling back.
Back for that affection I seek, for that love I so desperately desire, only to see that they will never reciprocate.
But each time I hold that small, twitchy ember in my quivering hands, that little hope, that maybe,— just maybe, I’ll get something in return.
A crumb, or perhaps a pat on the head.
I starve for slop.
And hunt as the prey.

Art is dying.
Intellectualism is dying.
They would rather have AI write hundreds of years of evolution into a single sentence.
A warped piece of ‘art’ with no soul behind it.
They would rather have AI create pictures, scenes, ideas— that it otherwise would never understand itself.
We are losing what it means to be human.
Turning into soulless, confused beings— stumbling toward a future that— this time, we cannot predict.
It is wholly unprecedented.
We can only hope upon the goodness in our hearts that we remain somewhat humane.
Just enough humanity to care for one another in these trying times.
Because being human, is art.
It is the one thing that we can say we’ve created with our own hands, our own souls— minds.
Seldom to ourself, and no one else.

I wish we could all be on the same exact page.
The same number, letter, punctuation.
The same whisper of breath that ascertains we understand one another.
That we can smile, breathe out in relief to know that we’re not all on different pages.
That we’re reading the same passage, with the same words, convictions, hopes and beliefs; all strung into one, confident, binding.
Glued together by wisdom and hardship.
That this book of credence isn’t furiously burning, shrouded contemplation, that we acknowledge it— this life, in unity.
That we can all maintain the fact that this world should be brought together by peace— not inhumanity and decimation.