Such a solace that comes with the world at its brightest
and its brightest moments.
I find myself fleeting from one moment to the next,
taking what I can from it and passing that along like a butterfly.
But the more my heart ages, the more difficult this becomes.
When you’re young, everything is colorful and hardly lucid.
Incomplete, in a way that lets you fill in the blanks
with whatever your heart feels is necessary.
Your world, and the worlds you create
with crayons on coloring books or chalk on the pavement.
Costumes in a bin with the scent of one hundred fairytales exhaling from their threads,
tickling your nostrils and swimming downward so you can taste the sweetness of imagination
dancing on your tongue.

Most flowers I visit these days are damaged,
their petals weak, their luster lacking.
They give me what they can, but it is seldom.
I pass it along gratefully to starving mouths and leave them disappointed.
Times like these, I wish I still had the bravery to grab a marker and color the walls,
splatter them with paint,
stain my environment
in the most innocent form.
Supposing I tried anyway, nothing would show
on top of the deep black paint
that’s been there since the day I moved into my new home.

My new home
has magazines on the coffee table dated earlier this year.
The curtains are closed to prevent glare from gleaming on the television,
which is paused on the screen of yesterday’s news.
The ***** cabinet above my bathroom sink
is filling to the brim with orange bottles and blue capsules—
the only constant that reminds me what day of the week it is,
and sadly, the lonesome reason I chose to awake.
And the only time color flows through my own hands anymore,
is when it bleeds from a black, ballpoint pen
in perfect cursive signing off my many debts
piled on top of my many to-do lists
I’ll never have time to complete.