I am desperately trying to ease my way back into solace,
caressing her name as I smear paint across my eyelids.
She floats off the tongue like a silhouette dancing against the wall,
feathery and light, a fairy that can’t be caught.
I coo at her resemblance to the girl in the mirror.
She looks so good, I wonder where she’s been.

Her eyes sing “found, I’ve been found” but
I can only see that home when I close my eyes.
The mascara stained eyelashes flap against my cheeks,
And the butterfly finally escapes.
I feel her slide down the bridge of my nose,
Gliding on the curves of my collar bones,
bouncing off of my shoulders into the air.

If I open my eyes then the silence will come,
The little girl inside me will have run
back to Neverland, and I need to chase after her.
I can watch her fly away if I stay this way, so I’ll know how
to follow her later, emulate her flight path
between the tightly packed houses in the west district
and the turns and curls of royal palaces.

I focus closely and memorize her route,
down to the star map and ballet flats,
and carefully, wearily, I open my eyes to sunrise outside.
There is a new day to be lived through, but I do not belong.
There is a song to be sung elsewhere, but when do I run?