A vow of silence,
No will to speak.
My words have been stolen
And they’re theirs to keep.
Seal your lips, lock them tight.
Would you like to know what life for me is like?

Life is poetry;
Months like lines and years like stanzas.
Poetry doesn’t always rhyme.
Some people have smooth, lyrical lives
Flawlessly pronouncing words like peace and sunshine.

Others aren’t so lucky, their poems are broken.
Broken like shattered glass and an old man’s sad eyes
They stumble and stutter, reading words like hate and genocide.
Sometimes people have a harsh poem read to them,
Their shattered glass handed down from the generations that broke it.
Some people keep stuttering, they don’t think to mend the glass

But others, they find rhythm in their sadness.
They turn their lives into lyrics, still fragile
But mended.
Mended.

This girl, she thinks ugly is a swear word
But she uses it every day in the mirror.
"Why can't I stop, why must I bleed?",
She screams at herself
She's only this loud when she's all alone.

This girl, she wants to be okay.
She just can't see why she feels so naive
"Can everyone be happy so I can just sleep?",
She whispers to herself
Her voice is always quiet even when she's all by herself.

This girl, she met a friend
Or maybe there were a few.
"Can you please stay here with me?",
She wishes she had the courage to say
To someone other than her reflection.

This girl, she needs something else
To numb the nothingness with which she thought she was done.
"I love you, please don't think I'm strange",
She finally said outside of her head, her voice has grown
From a withered whisper to this barely shaking scream.

This girl, she's more than a few days clean
Still weak, but learning from the bad, good, and in between.
"You're beautiful and worth so much",
She promises to her best friend
She still can't quite get the words across to herself.

I know why you hide behind sleeves
I know the pain behind your glazed over eyes
I can tell your real smiles from the fake ones you put on display
You avoid their questions, but Ive got one for you:
Do you really think you’re fooling me?
Wiping away your tears doesn’t help,
I could trace where they ran down your face

It's bedtime now but I know better,
If I slip into sleep you'll haunt me forever
You grab me with your fingertips
Your cup of poison I will sip
My mind is now a war torn place
You've reached my dreams and won't let go
I'm tainted now, souls can't be replaced
Happiness seemed so real
But then you took reality away
And filled my head with bitter lies
Morning is too far away
To wait for your demons to leave
This time I might not wake up,
Your demons will take me away
Before i have time to scream

My grandma sits shaking in her
Rocking chair, rocking.
Ten minutes ago, she got news that her mother died.
She had seen her earlier that day.

Sometimes things that you can't control
Are the absolute worst. Very rarely are they great.
Sometimes I wish I could take the wishes
From children with their shiny pennies.

Sometimes people cry over loss
And tears just need to fall in episodes of
Trembling, and shaking bones.
Because sometimes being strong is not enough.

Sometimes the rockers on chairs that rock,
They squeak. And maybe it's because
Sometimes those rockers get tired of being strong.
They get tired of being silent.

Sometimes you see things that you
Wish would stop replaying in your head.
Sometimes you hear abstract words
That just never leave the inside of your ears.

Sometimes when people grieve,
They get so wrapped up in who they lose
That sometimes they lose themselves.
My grandmother will not lose herself.

I have always known that
No matter what happens, she will
Always tell me to follow her footsteps and be strong,
I can't imagine being strong if she were gone.