The cold
is all that is left after death

Brilliant star, beautiful child,
Why must you too leave?
There is a flash of jewel colours
A scream of hot fire
An explosion of gold and silver
And then
there is
nothing

Mighty void, eternal child
Why must you too leave?
Over uncounted millions of years
Yet not quite eternity
You gently fade away
And then
there is
nothing

Little particle, my first child
Why must you too leave?
The very forces that make this possible
This wonderful existence
Have undone you
and then
there is
nothing

And I am alone
And I am nothing
The cold
is all that is left after death

What am I made of?
Thoughts and dreams, floating up into the sky on new grown wings
But they are ****** down, by a force greater than us all.

What are thoughts made of?
Strange is the universe’s insistence on tragedy
So why not retreat to a charmed world of fantasy?

What is existence made of?
It is designed by a cruel creator to be impossible to reach the top.
So we must be content to live on bottom, which is more beautiful anyways.

Maybe something that was once a part of you
Now exists within me
And that makes me happy.

Her mind
is never empty
All the time, it is full of wild thoughts that she can never escape

Beautiful thoughts
like the stars twirling through the void

Sorrowful thoughts
like the tears she holds in her lap like clear jewels

Violent thoughts
like the screams of the one who fell

She rips a feather from her wings
because she’ll never use them to fly

And instead she dips it
in ink, or blood
to her, there is no difference

Because her page will not be empty
And her thoughts will take flight, as sentences and words
and sometimes tears

Because she is the Writer
There are stars in her eyes
There’s a universe in her wings

My dreams floated into the sky
and then fell down into eternity,
like snow falling into the sea,
making her shiver at the horror of it all.

Half forgotten reveries swirl through my mind
and stars burst on my skin,
extinguished by the wind and the water
as I try to forget and remember at the same time

Maybe someone else will be there
to catch those fell fantasies in their hands
as they stream from the moon and into the sea
and she will shiver as my thoughts seep into her blood

Falling backwards into the sky,
We both have the same revelation.
No matter how lucid we are-
Nothing we do matters because we’re all going to die.

In both our moments of clarity,
We wept for the achievements of all of humanity,
To be erased with one stroke of wings,
Extinguished with one mighty claw’s swipe.

Falling into the sky like lanterns
Are our collective hopes, dreams and fears.
But mine has gone dark.
The gentle moon and the dying sea no longer sing of oblivion.

I spend
Fictional money on fictional things
Because I am more fictional than I am real.
Because I feel alien, like I am not of this world.

And I make
Digital purchases in digital worlds
because I've been living in one since I was three.
At least my cage had a dusty old computer.

So often I wished that I could climb inside
to be with the sparkling gifs, and neon dogs
and people whose names I did not know.
They too, were aliens, not of this world.

Maybe we all live in a poorly written fanfiction
or a comic littered with jpeg artifacts
posted on deviantart in 2007
and abandoned to rot by our god.

Maybe someday, she will pick me up and dust me off
and protect me from all those who cringe
at the juvenile creation of just another moody artist
of just another sad internet poet.

The arms of a little girl are welcoming to the ones she loves. Gently, she reaches up, and innocently wraps them around the object of her affection, perhaps a grandmother, or an uncle only seen once a year.

Returning the affection, the family member will gently pat her head, or offer a kind word.

“Why do you hug like that? You’re doing it wrong and it’s weird. Here, let me show you how to do it.”

Someone else swoops out of the shadows to hug her. It is a sterile and cold touch. One that makes her shy away, not understanding what is happening.

She looks at me and I see her discomfort, but am unable to do anything for her. The shadow leaves long after I do, and she slinks away to find someone better.

But the scent of fear still lingers in the air, soft enough for her acute senses to pick up on it. She looks for the source, but only sees me. I avert my gaze from hers, but still understand what she says.

Why are you a stranger to me if I’ve known you all my life?

You see, if my hands have been anywhere near your neck, I’ve probably thought about how easy it would be to **** you. That’s why I’ve been trained to never offer hugs.

It has nothing to do with you, I just have really bad intrusive thoughts sometimes.

She looks at me, and lifts her upper lip, showing her teeth, glistening white with fresh strings of saliva.

And now is the time I choose to make eye contact. Her eyes are a curious colour, one only heard of in the most bone chilling of myths. I half expect them to freeze me solid, but instead their empty stare speaks to me, saying:

I am not a part of this reality.

I am not a part of this reality.

I am not a part of this reality.

Someone come take me away.

Like light beaming through the window
and the miniature shadows of dust motes
blowing off the miniature worlds within shelves of books

Like a traveler in the night
floating on the sweet scent of jasmine
and shaded eyes hiding brilliant stars

Like having one pocket full of crystals
and the other, a collection of foreign coins
tucked neatly into the night satin cloak

Like the welcoming chatter rising,
half of it not of this world,
as the voices of flickering candles and shadows.

Like the deep recesses of my mind
and the silken ripples that say:
Yes, this place is my home.