This box.
I’ve wrapped myself in the darkness inside it,
I’ve run my fingers upon its walls
Feeling the coldness of stone left untouched by the sun.

This box.
There was a time when it was just a place for
Storing my heartaches and
Containing my sorrows
But one day I poured too much, and I myself
Tipsy, teetering, tumbled.
I fell in.
And I have not escaped since.

This box.
Every day, I tell myself
“You’ll get out.”
“You’ll find a way.”
“You can do it.”
But my hands slip from the rims and edges
And my feet falter and fumble
And I spend one more day, one more eternity,
In this box.

This box.
I heard someone call through the walls of wailing and layers of lies
That He’s coming to save me,
That I will soon bask in the light,
Be free once more.

But, this box…
I had grown to like it.
Somewhere between the lines of fear and pain
I had lost my love for what’s righteous.
Like a child walking to close to the train tracks
I was too self-absorbed to know what was good for me.

This box.
I let my screams run out,
And as they echoed in the cube
I drowned out His promises
And all fell silent.

This box.
A figure appears at the hole at its top
He says
“I won’t give up on you,
Even if you’ve given up on me.”
A ladder falls towards me,
And He descends to rescue me.

He picks me out of the murky waters.
“Stop!” I scream

He carries me toward the light.
“You’ll die if you save me!” I cry.

His foot ****** itself on a pain,
His hands fill with welts from a worry,
“Let me be who I’m used to being!” I howl.

We reach the surface, and my eyes open for the first time.
I stare at my savior.
“Thank you. But… you could’ve died, for me.”
He smiles, then extends his arms to show the scars of the Cross.
“Who says I haven’t?”

This box.
I am a slave to my own pains no more.
I now live in God’s holy light.
Warm.
Exhilarating.
Scintillant.

Some read books to remember.

I reached my hand into the familiar darkness that enveloped my backpack,
Slipping my fingers between
yellowed notebooks
and forgotten pencils
to grasp a memory in solid form.

As the leather that enclosed paper portals to the past
Ascended out of the deepest recesses of my dilapidated schoolbag
I couldn’t help but feel a sense of
Home.

The only way I feel that now is through the pages of the journal,
Each alabaster sheet lined with emotional braille for my fingers to explore.
Explore the time when I:
Spilled some juice on my journal during a camp,
the paper wrinkled to attest to it.
Needed spare materials for making my art projects,
the frayed edges of torn paper remain to attest to it.
Had sunk into the deepest cellars of an affection that would never be reciprocated,
the heart-shaped holes in the pages reflecting the holes put in my heart
lingered to attest to it.



I kept reading through the night,
Filling my clock with convivial memories of scintillant days and ethereal nights
Where moments of happiness and peace met like how the ocean washes onto the shore
And before I knew it, the last grains of time streamed through my fingers
And sleep took me into his mellow embrace.  

But even in the fortresses of the dream world, evil still slithers to find me
It crawls on its underbelly, sneaking towards my bed high up in the tower
And there, it throws me out the window,
And I plunge into another world.

She is hunched over a paper at the desk,
A smile fills her face as she signs the document.
Dread wracks my heart, and I crumple into a corner to watch it unfold.
I see her rise like a dragon almost slain in battle,
A victorious look adorns her face as she leaves her seat.

Then I burst in.
Little, unaware, nine-year old me.
With tears straight from my soul cascading down my cheek, I ask if I’ll ever see my father again.
Rage replaces triumph as she storms over to me, then strikes me across my face with a typhoon of force.
She screeches “never talk about” before nearly choking on my father’s name.
Little me crumbles into the floor, becoming the rubble that once was a happy child,
While my mother stomps towards an alcohol cabinet that would soon become full of empty bottles.

I, the spectator, shudder heavily in remembrance.
The only thing worse than a nightmare is a memory.
I wake up in my bed, sunbeams gleaming through my curtains.

I reach my hand into the familiar darkness that envelops my backpack,
Slipping my fingers between
yellowed notebooks that are filled with inhumane insults about being an abused kid,
and forgotten pencils that were used to write letters where I bled my troubles onto paper,
to grasp a new book.

As the paperback that enclosed an adventure to a new world,
Where the family of the lead character gave more love than they did punishment,
Switched places with a journal covered in old, worn leather,
I couldn’t help but feel the need to stick my nose right in there and get reading.

Some read books to remember.
Some read books to forget.