If a ship is replaced piece by piece, part by part,
It will eventually become an entirely new ship.
Not a shred of the old one will remain,
Except in memory.

I have tried to die a thousand times.
I think I’ve killed a piece of myself in each attempt.
In theory, if I **** and rebuild myself piece by piece, part by part
Eventually the “me” that is left will be entirely new.

Sylvia Plath once said, “Dying is an art”;
I wonder if I’m finally an artist.

The plane is racing toward the sunset. The sun glows orange and tiny and impossibly bright, like a singularity. It’s a speck of intense energy that hurts to look at, but who am I to look away? Who am I to pretend I can resist the pull of such power? Who am I to shield my eyes from the closest thing to divinity that I am able to see? We pick up speed, like we’re chasing the sun— like we’re chasing God. I think, in a way, we always are. I’d be lying if I said I’ve seen anything like it. I’d be lying if I said I held onto my breath after seeing it.

Not until you can see the pain in our eyes, the scars on our skin, the protruding ribs and distended stomachs of malnourishment, till you can gape at small black bodies disfigured by kwashiorkor and colonization, till you can gasp at people that don’t look like you being branded like cattle, like animals on their way to the slaughterhouse
(and thank goodness we’ve come so far, things used to be so bad)

Not until you can marvel at the mottled marks of a whip, the black and blue bruising only white hands can inflict, till you can shake your head at teens boldly drinking under a whites only sign, till you can cover your mouth and peek through fingers at the water hoses, the dogs, the guns, the blood— black blood on black bodies in black and white photographs
(and you inwardly sigh, relieved that it was so long ago and so far away)

Not until you can retweet teenagers face to face with riot gear and tear gas, till you can shake your head and show that you’re different because your black studies class told you so, till you can give a 40 character message about how sickening the violence is, but you keep watching the videos of him her him her him her him her him her
them
shot choked kicked punched beaten whipped slapped
killed
by government sanctioned executioners

Not until you can see everything but understand nothing

Always have to be ugly raw hurting bleeding suffering
Why can’t we be smiling laughing eating dancing breathing

Why can’t we be smiling

Why

I am all the books I’ve ever read, all the movies I’ve ever seen, all the songs I’ve ever heard
I am the snippets of conversation I overhear in the dining hall
I am the scribbles on the chalkboard of my 11 am class
I am the coffee stains on my mother’s mail
I am the torn out pages of my journal
I am the whispers in library study rooms
I am the thumping music of the club I am too young to be in
I am the blood dripping from a wound made too fast too deep too careless
I am the popping in my ears as my plane steadily ascends beyond heights any person should go
I am the angry yelling I try not to hear
I am the deafening silence I wish would be interrupted
I am the heartbeat racing faster and faster and faster as I lay completely still in bed, head covered my my blanket
I am the too-loud laughter in early hours of the morning
I am the tears blurring vision as I receive bad news
I am hope
I am fear
I am hate
I am love
I am everything

if you zoom out a little, the stars disappear.
a scattered array of backlit windows take their place, illuminating a world of their own.
if you zoom out a little farther, even those disappear.
how far must we zoom until there’s nothing?
if everything is quantified by our perspective,
what exists beyond our sight?
nothing?

everything?