in another life
i hand myself the softness i craved
the hush of a nursery,
tiny socks folded in drawers,
the scent of baked cookies
and giggles echoing down a hallway i built
with both hands and every part of my heart.

in another life,
i let myself be her
the one who kneels to tie shoelaces
and learns their favorite video game
just to lose on purpose.
the mom who never forgets a bedtime story
even when the world outside forgets
everything else.

but not in this one.
not here.
not when the sky falls in headlines
and safety feels like a myth
told to children too young to know better.

my mother still holds hope
she says:
you’d be a good one.
you’d love so fully, they’d bloom.
but she doesn’t see
that my love is the very reason
i won’t.

because to carry them
into this chaos
this fractured, loud, unforgiving place
feels like betrayal
dressed in lullabies.

so i stay empty,
not from lack
but from a fullness of care
so deep it aches.

and maybe
in another life
i will not love them
by leaving them behind.

mornings are
 hazy green.

not fog.
just something thick

i can’t walk through
without forgetting

what i was doing.

i missed the magnolia bloom.
again.

it’s always

just over.

like it was waiting for me
to look away.

i clench my jaw

until it breaks.
rip my heart out of the chest
only to sew it back again
maybe it’s

placebo happiness

through sadness

just enough feeling

to not feel numb.

just enough

to trick myself

into thinking

this is living.

sometimes

i tell myself

everyone hates me.
not dramatically.
just

like a fact.

like a quiet truth

that’s easier
than
well
uncertainty.

maybe this is
diet joy.
lite living.
a knockoff feeling
from the back shelf
that still gets the job done.
placebo soul.

but lately,
i’m scared of being alone.
the shape of my voice.
it knows me
too well
too precisely,
and wants
something
i forgot how to give.

We cut one another
Down to the very flesh
While we miss each other
Deep inside our bones

Isn’t that ironic?

I’m sat in the window seat
Cool against my head,
vibrating softly with the hum of the tracks

Outside
snapshots of other people’s lives
A woman brushing crumbs from a table,
a child leaping over a puddle,
Grandmas saying goodbyes
Some sun,
some rain
Some days that feel like nights

The train moves forward,
always forward
No signs,
no names,
just a blur of motion and color.

Passengers shift around me,
luggage tucked under seats,
eyes full of somewhere
Their faces carry a quiet certainty,
as if they all agreed on the destination
before boarding

But I didn’t
I hold a pass stamped Nowhere.
No stop to look forward to
No reason for being here
except that I already am

I can’t get off
The train doesn’t stop for questions

There’s a tightness in my chest
that rises with each tunnel,
each bend,
each hollow station passed
And it’s not the motion that makes me feel sick
it’s the stillness underneath it
This strange dissonance
of moving so fast
yet going nowhere

I thought maybe the journey would reveal something
But the longer I sit,
the more the windows reflect back only myself
faint, flickering,
unmoved

Just headed
Nowhere
that never arrives.