it’s my body that bears the proof,
a shoulder torn by the thing i adore.
the water calls me, and i answer,
though it leaves me aching to the core.

isn’t this the way of it?
the things we love demand their price.
a bicep strained, a heart undone,
each lap of joy, a sacrifice.

but i keep coming back,
to the pool, to the pain, to the hope.
even when it hurts, it’s worth it—
a lesson etched in every stroke.

E. your laugh is a melody that i long to hear.
i’ve memorized how it feels to find you in every moment.


S. I missed you more than anyone could know, and I can’t lose you again, don’t leave anymore.
You know me more than anyone else, and nobody knows you know anything.


E. the secret of us is in the way we keep making eye contact when no one’s watching.


S. I can’t stop looking at your beautiful face, did you notice?


E. those golden eyes are sometimes stormy, yet somehow always home.


S. Your hair waves in the breeze, golden strands shining brighter than the sun.


E. with you, i never feel like drowning, it feels like breathing again.


S. I love you so much my heart grew.

the summer air was thick with goodbyes,
and you left before fall could call us back.
i watched you go, a piece of me in your hands,
like sand slipping through my grasp.

they say time heals, but it just aches,
the empty halls, the spaces you filled,
a silence where laughter used to be;
a shadow of all we built.

i count the days, but you feel far,
like a star faded from the sky.
i’m here, stuck between missing you
and trying to learn how to say goodbye.

i climb the hill,
one foot in front of the other,
the summit in sight,
but no joy waits for me there.
just the echo of a sigh:
it’s over now.

the cheers sound distant,
like they’re meant for someone else.
i smile on command,
a mask as thin as paper.
inside, i collapse, whispering:
it’s over now.

big or small, the finish line comes,
but never the pride.
i carry the weight of relief,
not triumph.
the quiet mantra follows me:
it’s over now.

when did the journey lose its meaning?
when did the end become the only goal?
the cycle turns, and still,
i can’t stop chasing the next hill,
just to whisper, once again:
it’s over now.

i want to stop bleeding,
but the only one who’d understand
is the reason i start again.
there’s no one left to hold the weight
but me, and i’m so tired.

i’ll be getting over you my whole life

happiness slips
right through me.
like i was born
with holes.

is it worth the weight i bear,
this climb i’m told will lead to more?
for debts and desks, for restless years,
a future i’m not reaching for?

the days grow long, the nights too loud,
the pressure builds, it pulls, it binds.
a whispered thought begins to form,
what’s left for me, what will i find?

but then, a breeze, a song, a smile,
a fleeting joy, a gentle flame.
it cuts the dark, it lifts the weight,
reminds me life is not a game.

perhaps the climb will bring me peace,
or paths unknown that lead to gold.
for in the cracks of heavy stone,
there’s light and love still yet to hold.

August is the Sunday of summer
A slow, heavy sigh
That drifts over the sun-bleached days,
The bright, lazy hours.
The heat hangs like a memory,
Lazy and heavy,
As if summer itself is reluctant
To slip back into the pages of a calendar, Where days blur into the promise of something else.
The mornings are a bit less forgiving,
The air tinged with the shadow of a classroom,
The soft whisper of new pencils and paper, The hint of structure returning.
August brings a shift,
An undertone of anticipation
That stirs beneath the calm surface,
Like the distant hum of an old alarm clock, Waiting to signal the end of rest,
The beginning of something expected, yet feared.
The long, sun-drenched afternoons
Feel like a final, quiet farewell,
Each day a little more golden,
a little more fragile,
The bright edges of summer
Softening into the muted tones of
The school year to come.
August is the Sunday of summer,
A quiet, nostalgic refrain,
Where every fleeting day
Echoes with the promise of change.
As the sun descends a bit earlier,
And the nights grow cooler still,
August lingers like a gentle reminder
That summer's end is near,
Soft and unspoken  
That the season is changing,
And with it, the slow, heavy sigh
Of summer’s final, golden hours.
August is the Sunday of summer,
A sad, lingering pause
Before the structured rhythm
Of the days that follow,
A silent, reflective bridge
Between the freedom of sunlit days
And the routine soon to reclaim us.

you said you’d plant
weeping willows for me,
one in the backyard
of a house we don’t live in yet.
but i can see it.

the wind makes the branches sway
like they already know our names.
like they’ve been waiting
for us to come home.

you say,
“whatever you want,”
and i think
i want everything
as long as you’re in it.

maybe someday
we’ll take that car ride
where we’re not supposed to go,
laughing too loud,
with the windows down,
breaking a few rules,
but not each other.

and maybe
the world won’t always be kind.
but we’ll have that backyard.
those trees.
this promise.
and i’ll know i was loved
by someone who wanted
what i wanted
just because it was mine.

you were never poison,
but you were the first sip.
the first ache in my chest
i couldn’t name
until it spilled over.

i loved you like a secret,
buried under skin and
shoved between apologies,
but still, you found your way out.
every time.

and now,
every spiral starts with your name.
every hollow night
traces back to
your golden eyes
and the way i used to be
before i ever met them.

you were the gateway drug.
not the overdose,
not the blade,
not the shaking hands or the
bottle of pills i keep by my bed.
but you.
you were the first high,
the first crash,
the first reason i stopped
trusting the calm.

and it freaks me out.
because i’m old enough now
to know what love isn’t.
to know that you opened a door
i still can’t close.
and you walked through it
like it didn’t even lock behind you.

i think i hate you for it.
but mostly,
i miss before.
before you.
before i knew what this meant.

i don’t want a new life.
just this one,
rewound.

same people,
same streets,
same chances.
but this time,
i choose right.
i speak when i should.
i leave when i must.
i keep the pieces
of myself intact.

maybe then
i wouldn’t carry
a body full of regret.
a mind
scribbled out
and rewritten
too many times
to read clearly.

i don’t want to vanish.
i just want to undo
what broke me.

i’ll just suffer in the unknown tonight
hey, it’s what i deserve

i wake up,
and the weight is already waiting,
an invisible ache that sinks
into the spaces where joy once was.

everything feels muted,
like the world has dimmed its lights,
leaving me to stumble
through shadows that never shift.

i carry it all—
the quiet expectations,
the loud regrets,
the fear of not being enough.

and yet, i keep walking,
not because i want to,
but because stopping
feels like giving up on something
i haven’t even found yet.

is this what life is meant to be?
a series of steps through exhaustion,
a battle against the voices
that say, “you’ll never escape”?

i am so tired.
of pretending, of pushing, of hoping.
but still, somewhere in me,
a small voice whispers:
“keep going.”

i think i’m like the sun.
you bask in me,
let me warm you,
fill you.
i light you up in ways
you didn’t know you needed.

and it feels good,
until it doesn’t.
until you wake up
burnt,
red,
empty.
betrayed by the very thing
you thought was saving you.

i never meant to hurt you.
i only meant to glow.
but maybe i don’t know
how to shine
without setting fire.

have you ever been so nervous
you felt your ribs were closing in,
your lungs trapped in their embrace,
each breath a desperate thief, stealing air?

have you ever been so nervous
your hands forgot their purpose,
shaking like leaves in a storm,
fingers betraying your will?

your stomach twists—
a knot that tightens with no end.
your heart, relentless,
beats faster than it should,
as if it’s running from itself.

you tell yourself to calm down.
you tell yourself it’s nothing.
but nothing feels this heavy,
nothing feels this alive,
this threatening to consume.

have you ever been so nervous
you thought, just for a moment,
that it might swallow you whole—
and you wouldn’t even fight it?

it almost took her once.
the quiet visitor she never called,
the thought that slips in uninvited,
nestles in the corners of her mind,
and waits.

she carries it like a secret,
pressed deep into her aching chest,
a weight no one else can see.
some days, it whispers,
soft as falling leaves.
other days, it roars,
demanding its due.

she doesn’t want to leave,
no, not really.
but she wonders how much longer
she can bear the burden of staying,
if it is even worth it anymore.

they tell her it’s a choice.
they don’t see the fight.
the way her hands tremble
on the edge of surrender,
how her heart pleads
to keep beating.

she survives for now,
but the uninvited waits,
patient as ever,
just beyond the door.

she said “i can tell you’re not okay”
like it was a passing thought, a flicker, a footnote,
and then she kept going.

like it didn’t matter that i was sinking.
like it didn’t matter that my lungs were half-full of water.
like it didn’t matter that i was drowning.

she said “i see you breaking” and then broke me harder,
pried my ribs open and set up camp,
tossed her pain into my chest like it had a home there.

and i held it.
i always hold it.
i bear the weight of her like it’s my duty,
like love is carrying her pain until i collapse.

i think she believes if i can save her,
she’ll stay afloat.
but she doesn’t realize
i’m not on the shore.
i’m in the water with her.
and she’s got her fists in my shirt,
pulling me down,
down,
down.

she never asks how much air i have left.
she never stops to notice my limbs trembling, my throat burning.
she just says “i’m hurting” and i say “i know”
and she says “hold me up” and i do.

and she says “i can tell you’re not okay”
and then lets me sink.

and i love her — god, i love her —
but i think she might love me more when i’m breaking.
because then i have no choice but to stay.
and she has no choice but to lean.

and i’m so afraid that if i let go,
she’ll slip under.
but i’m starting to realize
if i don’t let go soon,
i will.

i come clean
with chlorine in my hair
and a damp towel heart,
still wrung out
from pretending i’m fine.

she asks me
to hold my sadness
up to the light
like it’s a gemstone
i forgot i was wearing.

on a scale of one to ten—
(what if it’s an eight
but shaped like a childhood memory?)
i say “seven.”
i lie.
or maybe i don’t.

she asks me to measure it,
but how do you chart
a thunderstorm’s favorite room?
how do you scale
the hush of drowning?
still, i try.

she nods
like she understands.
and maybe she does.
or maybe she just knows
how to fold a pause
into something gentle.

she writes,
i wonder what part of me
she’s translating
into numbers,
into categories of deficits.

either way,
i press “leave meeting”
and stare at the screen
long after it goes black.
not sure if anything changed,
but at least
i showed up.

you don’t notice the sun
until it slips below the horizon,
taking warmth and light
to some other corner of the world.

you don’t hear the clock
until the room falls silent,
each tick louder than
the love you took for granted.

you don’t see the magic of childhood
until you’re looking back,
realizing the world was perfect once,
and you didn’t even know.

you don’t feel the weight of silence
until their voice is gone,
the words they don’t say
echoing louder than the ones they did.

you don’t know what you’ve got
until it’s nothing but a memory,
a ghost you can’t outrun,
a lesson learned too late.

you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone.

i like the way the sun prickles my skin.
like it’s noticing me,
saying my name in heat.
i lie there and take it,
grateful to be wanted
by something so distant.

it burns slowly,
soft as a lullaby,
and i tell myself it’s warmth,
not warning.

i lie still,
my body blooming into color
like a secret i forgot to hide.
no one sees it.
but i’ll feel it later.

just like always.

i’ve got this perpetual guilt.
i’ve hurt everyone i’ve ever loved,
but still they stay.
not in the way i need —
never when i’m pressing a blade into skin —
but still, they stay.
and still, it’s more than i deserve.

i built this place,
this hell i live in.
brick by brick, mistake by mistake.
i deserve the burn,
the collapse, the ache.
nobody knows the war inside me —
how my mind claws at itself,
and somehow,
i always end up losing.

i think i have perpetual grief, too.
i am always mourning something.
a love, a friend, a version of myself —
i think i’ve never really let go of anything.
everything i’ve ever lost
still lives somewhere in my chest,
heavy and sharp, like glass.

i try to pick up the pieces,
but i’m too tired now —
too hollow, too gone.
and every time i reach for myself,
i cut my hands on what’s left.

all that this stupid medicine does
is make me fall asleep at 10
and wake up at 6.
it’s stupid.

in the quiet moments
when the weight settles
there’s a familiar ache,
a shadow that lingers.

words that echo
with unraveled hopes,
a constant measuring
against an unseen standard.

every effort feels heavy
each smile a mask on my face
whispers of not quite enough,
never enough.

in a crowded room,
even laughter feels distant,
a reminder of the places
i can’t quite reach.

still, i search for a glimmer,
but the weight remains,
shaping who i am
the truth of the matter

i will never be good enough

the water greets me, a mirror and a veil,
cold and unyielding, yet somehow forgiving.
with every stroke, my body protests,
screaming in soreness, pleading for stillness.

the lane is endless,
marked by the rhythm of my breath,
a metronome of effort and will.
each lap erases the outside world,
until it’s just me and the silence beneath.

this isn’t about speed, or glory,
it’s a battle of mind and muscle,
against the doubt that rises like waves.
in the water, i am both lost and found.

i wish i didn’t make it so hard to be loved,
didn’t push you all away when the sadness comes,
again and again, like a tide i can’t control.
sometimes i wish you could stay forever,
that the world could stop turning,
and nothing would change.

you’d argue, wouldn’t you?
say, “we love you, of course we do.”
but you don’t know me—
not really, not the pieces i keep hidden.
i don’t even know myself.

i wish i could just be.
be happy, be flawed,
be sad without apology,
angry without shame.
but it’s all harder now,
and i’m clinging to hope
as tightly as i can.

ohhhhhhh i get it
this is what i deserve!

is this what growing up is like?
losing a piece of myself,
over and over?
because if so,
i don’t want to anymore.

you texted me today
asking me how i’ve been
i didn’t have the heart to tell you
that i’m drowning in a sea of thought
crushed beneath the pressure and pain
so i told you i’m good
(as if my arms aren’t littered with scars)
how are you?