The walls are caving in,
but I can’t remember if I built them or if they’re just the ghosts of where I’ve been.
Your name is the ember in my chest—
I’m always burning,
but I can’t figure out why yet.

I wear your touch like a tattoo
etched into my skin
but it’s fading,
and I wonder if I can really feel it anymore
or if I’ve just learned to forget the ache.

My hands tremble like an abandoned house in a storm,
looking for something to hold,
but everything I touch slips between my fingers
like time,
Like memories,
Like all the parts of me I forgot and can't remember,
And like all the people who promised to stay but never did.

I was naive to think love was the key
to unlock this bottomless abyss inside my ribs and inside my chest,
but now I'm just fading away,
like the echoes of voices I never wanted to hear but make me feel so much less lonely.
I fill the silence with smoke
and stories that don’t belong to me—
Or perhaps stories that were lived through my eyes but I can't actually see.

I’m running from the ghosts of myself,
but they don’t let me go.
They pull me back to that place,
In that house
where I learned that pain is the only thing that ever feels real.
The higher I go,
The more I feel,
The greater the risk
the harder I crash.

But I can't stop.
I only let the blood mix with the rain.
I beg the sky for answers,
but the clouds never speak,
Forcing my to gather my own perception of peace.

I wanted to be saved.
By anyone other than myself
I wasn't ever taught to fly
But I learned to jump
And I jumped so high I found a cloud
One far away, one that's a lot less loud.
It's safer up here