Eighteen years have passed me
I still marvel at picturesque clouds
They pass us overhead, with grace, like the ground they face isn’t rotten.

Find me that girl who smiles every day
Exchanging her three am thoughts
Into golden plated words that are beautiful
They belong in her poems.
Sadness stained cheeks covered in blush
She’s so lovely, people think
but she’s just glad her mascara is waterproof.

My grandmother has dainty hands, unlike mine
and I was jealous.
until I realized that they were covered in blood
years before I was born and knew what pain was,
making a living and treating her blisters at the same time.
Six children but it used to be eight before two passed away
“Sofian, he died before your grandfather by a few years”
Her heart broken in half and tears encrusted in her skin
But she still has delicate and pretty hands right?

People say they love one another,
But I can’t even count the knives on their backs anymore,
There are too many.

When I find myself in solitude,
I subsequently lose myself in thought.

You know,
I am ashamed.
These angels that watch us every day
I know they weep at our state
And I am done pretending it’s fine.

This is a world where the ground shakes in anger,
The sky cries out of despair
And the air thickens out of confusion
I am all of nature’s catastrophies
In the shape of a woman.

You will see me in the corner
Praying for lost souls
Including my own
Hoping that one day we’ll reunite in a place
Where words don’t drip blood
And authors find that writing is easier when happy
But for now, we can’t get enough of pretending.