In the winter of
My darkest sadness
A candle glows,
Tiny and so far away.
It gives the darkness
A focal point and I
Struggle my way towards it.

Another candle lights my way.
I don’t know where it came from
But it makes a fearful journey
So much easier to manage,
And I eventually will dance
On thistledown to
The music of the Skylarks
In a sun-filled, cloudless sky.
  ljm

my sadness grows like ivy,
quiet, tenacious,
weaving itself through the seams of my ribs
until i mistake the ache
for architecture.

i wake in a room with no corners,
only echoes.
the air is damp with memory,
and something hums beneath the floorboards—
a sound like
what if.

rain leaks in through the ceiling
but never wets the ground.
i open the windows
to let in a sky that won’t look me in the eye.
it’s always dusk here,
somewhere between forgetting and too-late.

the mirror won’t speak anymore.
i ask it: am i still a girl
or just the shell she wore
before the flood?

in the dream,
i am made of wax
and someone keeps lighting matches.

A fellow poet said,
   I might
        be a bot!
I want to insure
    everyone,
     I'm most
       Assuredly not!
For I'm certain,my
   poetry would
     improve a lot!