the moon
is a testament
to the idea that
something so heavy
and encircled by darkness
can still
bring
light.
-rgp

my fears outrun me
while i stumble over air
i keep tripping over
what isn’t even there.
-rgp

her eyes are bloodshot and dried out
she hasn't blinked in hours
a screen flickers on and off
just as her mind floats in and out of consciousness

there's shadows on the ceilings
like ones she left behind in the city

she remembers a smile
and jolts upright in bed
there's a smile that haunts her

the sun rises in a couple hours
and she is still awake.

-rgp

i think you hurt me
and i think,
at the time at least
i liked it.

i liked that someone listened to me
that should’ve been the first red flag
no one listens to me
i mean no one like you listens to me.

and i didn’t think it odd or inappropriate
i’m gay,
i told you
i didn’t think you were a threat
and that should’ve been the second.

i didn’t think it was weird
when you asked me for selfies
because people swap selfies, right?
i’ve sent some pretty hideous double chinned bedhead dead eyed selfies to my girlfriend
how is it any different if it’s to a guy friend?

except it was different
you asked to see my thigh gap
my feet
my lordotic back because you wanted to see how my muscular dystrophy affected me
physically.
that should’ve been the third.

you called me pet names.
you told me you loved me.
you said you would always be there for me when no one else was.
fourth. fifth. sixth.

at first i thought it endearing and a platonic kind of love.
but you don’t say those things to a girl you met on the internet
i don’t.

i struggle saying those three words.
they weigh me down and make me choke on air when i try to say them out loud
so when you insisted i say them back, that you wouldn’t stop bugging me until i did,
i panicked
typed them, hit “send”
and cried later
and you told me it’s no big deal, everyone says “i love you”
not me. never me.
seventh flag.

you told me you’d visit
you told me we were meant to be
like a ****** up romeo and juliet
you spent your nights talking me down off of suicidal ledges
you thought you saved me
you kept telling me to just ******* eat, that starving myself was stupid, that you couldn’t have me die on you, that you were supposed to die first
“death is not a race,” i said
“you’ll win anyway if i don’t save you,” you replied
eighth flag.
i didn’t like it anymore.

i think you hurt me.
i can’t be too sure since you’ve convinced me you were just being friendly but i’m starting to come out of this fog you’ve put me in
and i do believe
you’ve hurt me.

-rgp

i thought that if i left it
in the yesteryear
i might finally get to sleep

you can’t leave a heavy it
on the stoop of a goodbye
and expect the door to contain its grisliness

like a puppy
it chased me
and clung to my leg
like a three year old

but those things are light
and my it dragged me down like quicksand
like a lover
begging me to come back to bed

just ten more minutes
of mind numbing pain
masked in silent nights
and silent cries

i’m such a fool

to think i could leave my it
when i hadn’t said goodbye.

-z.z

what happens when i no longer like your pink, sweet, version of me you’ve curated?
what would happen if i erased all colour completely?

no, i’m not talking about choosing blue over pink or yellow or green
“gender neutral” clothing isn’t any shade on the colour wheel

i’m talking about if i never associated the colour pink with femininity
and blue with masculinity

and yellow and green with “gender neutrality”

what if my life was just void of colour?

like if i were to say i didn’t feel like a girl nor a boy
nor the brief possibility of both

i just feel
like that grey space in between the most diluted shades on the colour wheel

would you still force me to call myself “daughter”?

i am apathetic.
which is funny, for an empath
to go from feeling too much
to feeling nothing
what stress caused the strings to break within me?
what bitterness and hatred caused a sudden lack of feeling?
oh
chronic depression
you’re back.
****.
-rgp

if you’ve ever gone through withdrawal,
you know that the awful part is not in the obvious shakes and pains
but in the facts that state how it was so that you got to this point
and the fact that your once saviour can’t save you anymore

the awful part is in the shame that follows—-
don’t ******* shame me for medicating my mind
or making decisions that provide me some temporary bliss,
some temporary ease,
some temporary it-doesn’t-*******-hurt-so-much
i know what i “got myself into”
i also “got myself out”
and i’d willingly go back

it’s silent at night
and then it’s not
it’s like someone is having a house party two feet away and the thermostat has been repossessed by a pixie and one second you’re fine but then the next it feels like you are quite literally shedding your skin

but that’s not the awful part.

you’re right in that the come down is just absolutely awful
but if i had the chance to do it over,
i’d still pick this.

-rgp

here’s a lie to keep you living
a veil of truth to shade your eyes
what searing pains your body has endured
are illusions from your mind

it’s nothing big, it’ll be alright
you shout above the cacophony upstairs
my monsters have just come out to play
they do that, you know, in my nightmares

we dance an endless waltz with darkness
and convince ourselves we’re fine
so what if we haven’t seen the sun in months
we’re alive, we swear, we’re not dying

but what happens when we stop showing up?
are we still here, or no?
does anybody miss us
or stop to ask “where did they go?”

will they notice the lack of color
will they miss our favorite songs?
will they wonder how we lived
with all of this darkness for so long?

nah, they won’t notice
it’s all an illusion anyway
at least that’s what the doctor said
that, and $150 for your stay

-rgp

i was planted in rocky soil
and raised by lies
i found a saviour in alternative music
and a god i could relate to in poetry

i don’t remember when
the world spun upside down
but i’ve been walking backwards on the celling ever since

the sun doesn’t rise here
it only sets
and when the stars come out to play
i like that i’m staring into the eyes of death

i guess my head was never ******* on right
maybe that’s the point
i hardly ever know what i’m doing
but **** that

-rgp

i am not bitter
i’m tired
of seeing headlines flood my timelines
worded similarly with a name substituted in as allegations break

i am not privileged
to be tired of seeing headlines flood my timelines
worded by way of another celebrity letting us down

i do not ignore
the bile headlines that sneak their way into my timelines
how can i?
but i am tired
of feeling let down

i am not blind
to the immense pain caused by a scream, silenced
but i am tired
of seeing the duct tape over her mouth

i wonder
if one day soon
i will no longer be bitter
or tired
of seeing headlines flood my timelines
worded by way of claiming
it was her fault

-rgp

i’m lost
my legs are tired
and the concrete looks like a trampoline
if you throw something hard at an even harder surface, the something does not bounce
it breaks
if i throw my body to the concrete that looks like a trampoline
my bones will shatter
but my soul will only bruise
and that annoys me

because i thought death was easy
it’s this life that’s hard
what happens when escaping life becomes so difficult that death disappears from sight
when i thought death was easy but there’s no more fight left in me
when did trying to die become so difficult?

they tell me i’m not alone
which i find to be pretty funny because when my thoughts are falling out of my head too quickly for me to catch i’ll look around
and all i see is fragmented thoughts splintered on the ground

you have commitments
appointments
social obligations that consist of lifting others up
you have a job
and friends
and school
and papers to write
i know it’s hard for you sometimes, too

i know i drag you down
you say you won’t entertain the thought that my existence is a show put on by lucifer’s angels because i’m just
dramatic
you say
my idleness is the reason why my brain is wasting away
i’m the reason i’m wasting away
if it’s all in my head,
will the pain get better as i get worse?

they tell me
i’m here
and they’ll miss me if i go but when i tell them i’ve been trying to leave for years
they tell me no
i’ve been trying to stay for years
i laugh

they tell me
there’s so much more to live for
smiles and hugs and really dumb jokes
art and literature and art and art and art
and art

one thing art has taught me?
everything dies
everything ends
and humanity’s soul takes a beating every time we try
to erase the existence they’ve worked so hard to create
we could be frail
and throw ourselves to the pavement
the headlines the next morning would read Another one Bites the Dust or something

it’s really hard to be positive when you don’t want to be
or remember how to be
when stats of suicide are so frequently reported you wonder if that’s what you’ll become, another statistic
“the percentage of suicides of queer, korean adoptee, catholic, females has now risen to 1% this is Fox News reporting”
or something

i’ve heard that.

when did trying to die become so difficult?

-rgp

And on the night her life changed before her eyes
She wept
Cheers broke out around her, congratulations and kudos were given
And she
Put up her forcefields and closed her doors once again
To mourn

In the trembling ground she planted a seed
And watered it with a concoction of part--saline-part-hopes-and-dreams drawn from the wells of her eyes
They never quite understood why her knee **** reaction was sadness
Nor did they know of the depths her heart could sink to
They didn't understand that she was different than the rest of them in that to her, happiness was a forced facade of what lie beyond cracked smiles

She mourned her relationships and any attempts to mend broken ones
She wept for the lives she'd never know
She mourned for her mother
She wept for the young woman who gave her up
She mourned the loss of her mountains
And her clear open skies
She wept so that she could no longer tell
Where the monsoon rains started
And where her tears ended

She felt her soul breaking
And she laughed
Isn't it funny
I find it hilarious
How I've shattered myself so frequently
That the shrapnel no longer hurts

-z.z

Euthymic. Happy in a depressive state.
Crash. I was too close to the edge.
Fall. It's such a long way down to the bottom
Fell. Less than 8 hours ago I was
Euthymic. It never lasts long, does it?

-z.z

vagrant lives she leads with fear
uncertainty tugs at her feet
at least, that’s what she thinks
the road calls her home
begs her to kick off her boots
and caress its trails with bare soles and a bare soul
the skies notes she hasn’t been around for months
that the sun missed her morning kisses
and the stars missed her guidance
and the moon missed her dancing
these days she’s as lost as the lives she’s supposedly guiding
trying to get them both up to a safe place again
so their souls can sing the songs their bodies once knew by memory
so her heart can start beating again

-rgp

My name is something I keep around like old trophies from youth competitions or scrapbooks of memories from a better time. It is a reminder and a bittersweet one of that of a thing I cannot change. I never liked my names. I wondered why my parents decided to drop the second half of my Korean name for the sake of 100% inclusion. Is nothing sacred? I wonder if they knew that by doing that, they stripped me of my origins. I despise my name. I despise the projection and enforcement of family it relays. How far are you willing to go to make sure the kid knows they are yours? Hell, make it into a ******* name that will follow them around for the entirety of their life. The fact that it’s so beautiful will offset the pain of hearing it butchered so many times, will offset the pain of hearing what isn’t mine, will offset the nullity I have come to feel every time I hear it. My name is a prison number of conformity.

i want to talk with someone
but i don't know how to say it
i want to talk just talk
not about specific life events or what i ate for dinner last night
please don't ask me about my family or my academics
ask me why my replies get short when you ask me how i am
tell me more than
well i'm glad you're still breathing
when that's my response to your short question
i know
that i can twist my words into appearing positive even when they're not
i know that my sarcasm doesn't always transcend beyond the computer's algorithms
i know that you don't know how to mitigate my suffering
and that's fine
really
it is
so we'll talk about you and your great life adventures
even though right now
i want to talk about the poem i just read by andrea gibson
i want to talk about my writing professor and her brilliant mind and how i've never been more motivated to get to class just so i could sit there and take in the simple grandeur
i want to talk about the night sky and i know it's overrated woohoo the stars and moon huzzah for the earth's night light but have you ever noticed
how when you stand out in the middle of the road at 2 am in the morning,
the world down here is silent and flat but up there, the galaxies stretch and bend beyond the eye can see, the stars are all placed so perfectly
hapharzardly scattered about but in the right places
sometimes they're so dim, you know?
i will never stop aweing over the miracle of the sky nor will i ever not stand in the middle of the road at 2 am in the morning on a rough night just to be reminded of the beauty that's still there within each and every one of us even though sometimes we can't see it
i want to talk about the dream i had last night
and the night before that and how i am scared to fall asleep because my mind is a ******* complex and ***** thing that can thread unimaginable hypotheticals through something that was supposed to be peaceful
i don't want to sleep
i want to talk
i want to talk with someone
because i'm tired of talking to myself
-
-rgp

if i were the drinking kind
i'd fill my body with enough poison i might slip into a deep slumber and not wake until the pain disappeared
my poison of choice
is music
melodies strung and sung so sweetly my heart aches until it numbs
when tears slither their way out of my dry, cracking face i try to convince myself i'm just rehydrating the dead cells that mask my tired bones
pay no attention to the hysterical grin, the Gucci bags under my eyes, and the hair that's wearing Thin and Matted like designer names on B-list celebrities
every night i cut the ambien into pieces, working my way up from halfsies to wholesies so i don't have to listen to the conversations i have with the walls in my room
it all hurts so ******* much, you know?
you don't numb this kind of pain expecting it to go away
you listen to it and coddle it and sit back as it consumes you because **** it looked so innocent
at first
when 10 am finally comes
hashbrowns with too much salt, a mug of cold tea, and a couple Prozac can remedy even the worst of depression's hangovers

sleep tight

don't let the bedbugs bite.

-
-rgp

the good poems
are constructed from fragments
of painful experiences
times when i felt numb and nothing
there's thought,
structure
or lack of anything entirely
the good poems
remind me of a time
that i can't really remember
i'm going back to this pain
because it's familiar
i remember what desolation looks like
i remember what silent screams ripped air in two and
my skin apart
the good poems tell of a time
where i was mentally so far gone
when i had a concrete concept of the darkness enfolding me but no concept of what scary was
the good poems aren't really good poems
there's just emotion there
i felt so much
and it hurt to touch
if i can somehow make sense of it all
rewrite my scars into fresh cuts again
remember the nullity i fell into
maybe i'll learn how to feel again
leave the past in the past and bury it with a hatchet
no need to dig up all the skeletons you once hid in your closet
you let chaos rest, why disturb it?
it never escapes you
i talk about past pains
like it's something i crave
what a foolish thing to want, to need
to thirst for to feel whole again
this pain
i think they call it growing pain
like the pain of physically shaking off an old skin that no longer fits
the skin i felt comfortable in and the skin i abused
so a new skin can grow
i miss the familiarity
and my limits
the good poems
weren't good at all
but in my head
they're good because
if i can fathom images of what trembling nights felt like
out of shaky breaths
that's better than when i can't
and if the only thing i ever write about for as long as i live is pain
then so be it
they say that you spend your whole life
rewriting the first poem you ever loved
perhaps
my definition of love
is synonymous with pain
perhaps pain
is synonymous with life
if that's true
then the good poems remind me of a time
when i was so so alive that i was on the brink
of death
-
-rgp

i don't believe you know you're destined for great things
you
mishappen collection of supposedly broken parts
souls of shards and borrowed hearts
you
do not fly away so easily

junk angel
don't you know
you are not damaged nor irreparably dismantled
underneath your suit of armour
there you are
beautiful and breathing
you are alive

junk angel
remember your origins
and look at how far you've come
-
-z.z

some nights
i feel like a lost cause
your grandma would tell me to pray to st. jude
i don't think even st. jude would be able to find the missing parts of me

lately i've been thinking a lot about change
i wonder if it's because of change that i can't seem to find myself
because of the disorienting earthquake that followed the hurricane Change brought on
that flung pieces of me far and wide
i have to go searching again, don't i?

i feel like i should be telling you something important
shed some light on how to overcome darkness
but to be honest, kiddo
i still have no idea
and if i dedicate my life to apologising for the fact,
my sorry's will bury me

there's a saying,
the calm before the storm
there's a feeling,
complete peace with a hint of blindness to the tsunamic waves approaching just beyond the horizon
you feel euphoric and skeptical and helpless
a smile creeps across your face
you brace yourself for impact but know that no matter how many times you've prepared yourself for this, no matter how many times
you've lived through this
you will fall, flail, and drown

that is what i feel when i sense Change lurking near
and i can't do anything to stop it
i'm tired, kiddo
i've forgotten parts of me
so bear with me as i continue to love you to the best of my ability despite all this
don't forget yourself
love,
auntie

suppose I wasn't destined for joy
that the complex systematic masses and impurities within me prefer darkness to thrive better in
because what if they knew all along
how much one can hide where the rest of the world isn't looking
they wouldn't know if I never smiled a day in my life
they wouldn't know if I did

suppose the off white of my skin means I'll live longer and isn't a result of the fact that I rarely see the sun
suppose I tossed the fake sun supplements into the garbage for some odd soul to seek sanity in
consider it a gift, these worthless pills I never needed in the first place

suppose I loved this life
and hated it at the same time

suppose I believed them when they told me it wouldn't be temporary
and I made myself a home in the nullity

suppose I felt something

.

if i write you a poem
i write validity across walls that do not warrant it
writing this poem, this confession of consciousness regarding a matter that makes my bones ache
is like sending you the letter you weren't supposed to have received
my dear i am sorry
that my heart is so prone to being broken that i know by now how to make art with its pieces while being blinded by my own waterworks
i am writing this poem
and you will be on the receiving end of it, oblivious to everything that is bad in this world prior to reading this maybe
i know i haven't lost you yet but i know i will eventually
and when i do
you will not hear my cries nor will you see the glistening droplets slide from my eyes like you did the one time i let you in
my dear i've always worked to shield you from the malice this world is capable of
loss is not malicious
yet it is and i hope you never have to live through losing someone who loved so much it hurt
i know i'm rambling now my dear
i'm sorry we ran out of time
you are so special
i know you're not gone yet
but soon
you will be
so this poem is a testament to you
i love you so ******* much
i'm not sorry for that how could i be sorry for loving you
my dear
i'll see you soon or
something

the last time I saw Death
I was waiting anxiously for his arrival
he'd been talked up so much in my life i just had to see him for myself, with my own two eyes
I was ready to meet the one who would put an end to my misery
when I finally came face to face with the creator of endings, tears slid out of my eyes so silently I wasn't sobbing or mourning but rejoicing
Death was so ******* beautiful, you know?
He put my mind at ease, and my soul to sleep
Kept asking me if this was what I really wanted
Death knows consent is **** but he also knew
I wasn't completely ready to leave yet
He stroked my cheek, wiped the tears from my eyes, and whispered
"not yet, love."
he promised he'd return but another winter has come and gone and
I haven't seen him since

i remember the fall
the wheezing hair-raising scream that pierced the air that followed
it was as if my lungs wanted to let the universe know i was about to embark on a trip down to the underworld but settled on a post to social media instead
“the person you are trying to reach is not available right now. they do not know when they’ll be back. but for now, leave a message with your name and contact info at the beep.”
i changed my profile pictures to an ambiguous shadow, shut down my feeds, and disappeared

i didn’t wake up in time
pulled the covers over my head and pretended i was dead
asleep

most nights while i was under, i dreamed vivid dreams that the diabolical freaks that ruthlessly engulfed me had disappeared like i
sometimes still do

most mirrors i looked into were as broken as i was
shards splintered off like the decaying pieces of my emaciated body
my heart was indignant and my brain would have argued back if it had had enough fuel to do so
i remember the charts and the scales the morning weigh ins the
pokingthepokingthepokingthepokingthepokingthepokingthepokingt­hepokingthepokingthepoking
the food diaries the room searches the itchy gowns the smells the eyes the eyes the eyes the envy the eyes
everywhere

i remember fall used to be my favorite season
.

my internal therapist is telling me to not write this poem
to not dwell on damaged thoughts, there's no fixing them, dear.
so maybe not.
maybe i'm not writing this poem to try to fix my broken thoughts
maybe i just want peace maybe i am hurting and writing this poem is the only way i know how to wade through the swamp of pain you've thrown me in
two years ago this week, i was getting ready to see my sister marry her best friend
i was bright eyed, had a mane of hair i couldn't tame, excited about life
i was joking with some new friends i'd made about one of them crashing the wedding
i was about to meet Anxiety for the first time
now here i am, shorter hair, sitting with my laptop perched upon sweatpant clad, starved, legs, my fingers not moving fast enough over the keys, i'm tired.
Anxiety and I have taken our relationship to the next level and he visits me often, particularly at night when I'm thinking about you
Anxiety gets jealous, punishes me, forces me to think about your words while suffocating me
i'm tired
i'm afraid that lies about me still flood your mind and i can't change that
i want to talk to you, have a conversation, ask you why
i've apologised and still i will say i am sorry because i am
why do you loathe me so much
i've had people tell me to get over myself, over you, over the situation and i'm trying
but i've never had someone do what you did to me and i'm hurting still this pain i wonder, did you intentionally do it to bring me down?
you've must've known what with my history of attention seeking self harming downward spiral
i never did it for attention
i've taken to numbing myself, last night i dug around my art supplies box for the set of extra blades my sister in law gave me for my pencil sharpener for christmas
i'm not sharpening anything, there isn't anything to sharpen
my friend tells me not to do it, that it doesn't do me any good long term
because that's what i'm dealing with right? long term pain?
sleepless nights and anxiety attacks
sadness i can't escape from
saying no when my niece asks me to play sorry willow i'm tired i'm so tired
so maybe my blades won't bring me long term salvation
maybe two years in therapy won't help but that's okay i was in there anyway for the big mess of my life that you told me to get over
maybe i don't care and am going to treat my thighs as cutting boards because temporary sanity is sanity and i've lost my head as it is
my therapist on wednesday will tell me to forget you
and i will try
and i will fail
i don't know why i'm writing this poem
i'm a crazy believer in better things
how this poem will make things better is beyond me but hey
sue me for trying to see hope in the little things
how artless of me
the artist in me, pain(ting)
-
-z.z

I am my parents’ worst nightmare and a blessing in disguise. My father says I am exercise for his mind. I love verbal defense. I love creating backstories and plucking reasoning out of thin air like a magician who pulls rabbits out of his hat. Verbal defense is an art, you see. It consists of passionate testimonials, backed by evidence, and so many ******* loopholes. I have mastered this art down to a T.

I ask that you imagine me complexly. I hate that you think you know me based off of a few things you’ve seen. No two people ever view the same thing. I believe you don’t know me. You can pinpoint a couple of my likes, my dislikes, but you don’t know the songs I sing when I’m alone. They’re not all sad, you know. But sometimes they are. You don’t know why or what or how. You don’t know that my favorite things are too far away from my grasp and they’re always so ******* hard to find yet I keep looking.

Imagine me complexly and maybe you’ll see something new. I know what it’s like to look at the world through scratched lenses. I know that after a while, you get a headache from trying to overcorrect what you’re seeing. So take the ******* scratched rose tinted glasses off. **** will be blurry but at least it’ll be as raw as you can stand, take a look, see here this is my being.

People used to tell me I should be a lawyer but that would take the joy out of arguing. Me? I want to fix broken things. I’m attracted to brokenness like a moth is to the buzz of a dying fluorescent streetlight. Isn’t that funny? I find it hilarious, that I think I can fix, heal and soothe the wounds of a broken world. I must be truly crazy if I think I can patch up some of the world’s lacerations. Maybe one day, when you imagine me complexly, we can talk about it. I’ll try my damnedest to not to try and fix you, because I’d be a flaming liar if I didn’t think you weren’t broken. So imagine me complexly. I'll wait, don't worry. Take all the time you need. Imagine me complexly.

Imagine me complexly.

-z.z

i didn't mourn your death
i didn't cry, didn't scream
didn't **** the world or any god for taking you away

and then i remember
english class, we all had to memorize Atticus's speech
you know, the one in the courtroom where he defended Tom Robinson

and then i remember
that you sang about leaving us before any of us knew you were gone
ziggy stardust, i miss you

and then i remember
i'm 7, maybe 8 years old
you taught me what imagination meant, what i could do, what alternate universes i could create

and then i remember
you loved so much you died with a secret
as i grew, i learned how to understand you

and then i remember
the day purple rain meant a nation mourning in unity

and then i remember
your song was in shrek and i'm sorry but that association from my childhood never left me

and then i remember
the amount of pain you endured

and then i remember
i was 11, my brother was singing along to hotel california, introduced me to your band and pointed you out to me
"that's glenn frey he's the guitarist"

and then i remember
why this year has been such a dark one
so much of the light has vanished with you

and then i remember

i never gave myself a chance to mourn your death

-z.z

I don’t want to write this poem
because I’m afraid of misinterpretation
but I’ve been feeling out of sorts lately I’m willing to risk that humiliation
if it means I’ll get some feeling of peace or
something
i’m i I guess just i mean gr no i mean oh can we just not talk for a moment?
My throat closes up, my tongue goes dry
I’m sorry I can’t I
am too tired to try
My mind is a canvas and I’ve only got black paint on hand and no clean paintbrushes available
like i’ve used all the colours that there’s no new ones to mix
there’s no more room
no new space
just
painting over it is too much work ******
I’m sorry
-z.z

There's this thing called the heart
It is an ***** vital for existence
It's a mass of muscle
It's the powerhouse of the body
It's not that pretty but
Existence was never pretty
-
We associate the heart with love
and symmetrically contoured shapes cut from red construction paper with safety scissors
We romanticize what love should be
Love flows from my heart to yours oh darling you're beautiful let me love you
-
From do you like me check yes or no to
Let me love you because I think you're wonderful
Let me show you all of the ways you are perfect
The way you don't stop being, like your heart that never stops beating
-
Science tells me that love is a series of chemical reactions firing off in my brain--
Endorphins that are being released every time I smile at you, they tell me the heart does not anatomically correlate to the sensation of what love feels like
-
Life tells me sometimes, Science doesn't know what it means to experience love outside of chemical reactions
Love feels like the rush of heartbeats palpitating faster and faster, like my ribcage is a house for one million butterflies trying to break free
Love feels like a moment frozen in time, the space time continuum doesn't exist here
We are operating on a different universe, and this one knows love exists in all forms, in every moment, in each sideways glance and "I think I like you"
-
Life tells me that the reason we associate an ***** vital to our survival to a feeling so intense
Is so that we won't forget that sometimes the very act of existence is to love
-
Te amo
I love you
La amo
I love him
Los amo
I love myself
Me amo
-
-z.z

She's looking into the glass again, getting real up close and personal
What about this image looks disgusting, wrong, or out of place?
I think it's my lips or my eyes or the landscape of my face
She moves down
Collarbone jutting out, shoulders that form a 30 60 90 triangle from slouching too much
A concave ribcage, ribs protruding through incandescent skin that scars too easily
A back curved by lordotic lords that make her arms dangle like a dead baby doll's
Too thin thighs that she can wrap her too small hands around and a gap between her legs a mile wide but **** those curves are shy
Knees that wobble and knock when she walks, they say she could've been a dancer by her gait, so awkward yet poised ******* she says I know I walk funny stop rubbing more salt into this ****** wound
She takes a step back from the shattered glass
and whispers I never liked you
*******
-
-z.z

some nights, i dream in technicolor
holographic three dimensional, i'm looking through shards of a broken mirror
my dreams are hallucinogenic memory strips of my day, played over and over
some nights, i dream in wet paint on a black canvas
on these nights, fear shakes me
my heartbeat pounds and i lay paralysed
everything is so blurry
other nights, i don't dream
those nights, my mind is endlessly the grey textured walls in my bedroom
they've seen my past but say nothing
because some nights, there's not much to say.
-
-z.z

Time slows down as you grow older
yet for whatever reason, I don’t remember waking up this morning
Age is a number determined by how many rotations around the sun you’ve made it and a year
is a ******* long time
yet by the time I’ve blown out my candles and finished last year’s cake,
I find myself in front of another, being serenaded by family, encouraged to make a wish
my days consist of waking up, going to class, coming home, doing schoolwork, eating, and then going back to sleep
I’m stuck in this routine to further my life whilst stopping it to some extent
I’m walking in place, the same scenery passing me by
until suddenly, I’m at my destination
I’ll look up, look behind, and marvel at how I seemed to get to where I was when it seemed only moments ago I was miles away
Headlines flood the news, one after the other, describing some world tragedy, some natural disaster, some marker that humanity is here
and then time will pass, the headlines will float to the bottom of the pool with hundreds of thousands of other headlines as if nothing had ever happened
days later, new headlines will wash up in their places
but they’ll be the same headlines, on the same televisions, being reflected back on the same screens to the same aging faces
after a while, they stop mattering
it becomes news again to the young but the same old to the elderly
after a while,
Time becomes your greatest nemesis
joints ache, hair turns to grey
complacency settles in like dust
all gradually, day after day after ******* day after day after day
almost coming to a complete stop
so you don’t realise it’s happening until you wake up
and you’ve been here a hundred rotations around the sun
and you wonder when the hell did Time **** me
-z.z

warning: i am mentally unstable, proceed with caution
warning: i am 18 years old, proceed with caution
warning: i am prone to falling, proceed with caution around me
warning: i talk to myself, proceed with caution
warning: my triggers are older men, proceed with caution
warning: i'm queer, proceed with caution
warning: i'm ballsy as ****, proceed with caution
warning: i'm passionate, proceed with caution
warning: i'm a fuckng unicorn and my horn is made of poison, proceed with caution
warning: sometimes i say things, proceed with caution
warning: words come out of my mouth uncensored, proceed with caution
warning: i really don't like condescending authoritative figures, proceed with caution
warning: i like arguing, proceed with caution
warning: i have a tendency to be redundant, proceed with caution
warning: i don't know what i'm ******* doing, proceed with caution
-z.z

every once in a while, i forget things. i forget that smiles are meant to last longer than a couple seconds. i forget that depression is my monster i must fight. i forget that i must fight. i'm tired. i forget that i'm supposed to be going to class, that a C- isn't the end of the world, i forget to tell my professors i'm not okay. i forget to hide behind a smile and sometimes words come out that you weren't supposed to hear. or maybe i know all of this. maybe i know all of this and i'm hiding. maybe i'm hiding.
-z.z

My alter ego has pixie short, electrifying purple hair
she is unafraid of being bold
she's got tattoos on her wrists, doc martins on her feet, ebony black talons, and a voice that booms to declare her presence
my alter ego is a sass master and snark shark
she can call you out on your b.s. faster than you can bat an eye
she will swing that bat at your eye, she's not afraid of using her words as defense weapons
but she knows when to stop speaking
one night I was speaking to my alter ego, asking her how in the world did she get to be so brave?
she laughed and said
darling, it's always been in us, you just haven't unsheathed the sword yet
you've been too busy hiding behind the shield, you forgot you know how to wield
you fight with gentleness, not bite
and that's okay
I shrunk further back into my bed, while she, larger than life, thunked me on the head, said you'll get there, kiddo
and suddenly she vanished, with a mischievous glint in her eye, disappeared to cause change.
-
-z.z

The thing about being disabled is that people seem to think you can't do anything. That the wheelchair I'm sitting in or hearing aids in my ears mean that I am not mentally capable enough to form sentences
I'm a quiet person
but that doesn't mean I can't speak
I just choose not to waste words

The thing about being disabled is that people always stare at you
Trying to figure out what my disability is when I get out of my car parked in the handicapped spot
She looks okay, so why? shouldn't she give that spot to someone who is actually handicapped?
Appearances, my dear, can be deceiving

The thing about being disabled is that it's a label designed by people who needed an explanation for why other people are different
Disabled is not synonymous with strong, at least, not in their books
though it always is in mine.

The thing about being disabled is that you gotta train your voice to screech
be loud when you feel like being quiet
because this label, these hearing aids, this chair, this lack of able-bodied-ness, does not define me
and I need to let you know that

I’m the kind of person who will stand up to you if you get in my face.
it has taken me years to get to this point
on a platform where I can voice my opinions freely
I’m careful with my words
though so not
if you cross me,
I will let you know
I’m the kind of person who can run a mile with blood on her knees, ignoring the sting
I’ll get to where I’m going
I will fall a million times and get up every single time
blood has got nothing on me
it’s not a race to the finish line, you know
I’m the kind of person who has double edged sword of sass and snark hidden in a sheath you can’t see
I’m pleasant and kind, always smiling
don’t let this aura deceive you
I can fight a battle with my words, always make it sound like I’m winning
I know when to back down
gracefully
when I lose, I’ll say so
take my pride and leave
I’m the kind of person who will fight for you
I’m a kind person for me.

i wanted to write a poem that would make me feel something
alleviate this pressure like a tourniquet,
Words, be bandages to my ****** wounds!
i pounded out poem after poem spilling heartache on the pages
i wanted to write something that would silence the monsters laughing at me inside my head
frida kahlo is known for saying
i don't paint dreams or nightmares
i paint my own reality
i write my dreams and nightmares

into my own reality
i write my monsters to sleep with sweet lullabies
i write my life into my feelings
and my feelings into my life
i wanted to create something that would stand on it's head
to make people awe and wonder
how is that girl surviving
with all those monsters hanging onto her?
i write to give my friends a voice
and find mine in the process
-z.z

What happened a week ago
I’m still recovering
Some have told me I’m in mourning
when you lose something that was a part of you for so long
I feel like I’ve lost a limb or
a big chunk of my heart
what happened a week ago
friendships severed, felt like an amputation without the anesthesia
sawing and gnawing
whittle by whittle
the pain, never less than searing
what happened a week ago
I feel the phantom limb
I think it’s still there
I go to my inbox, check the chats, click one and
BOOM
shouting matches and f-bombs being dropped like the a-bomb on Hiroshima
my words, arrows dipped in poison
I flung everything I had
poured my chopped up heart onto a silver platter and let the blood drip drop for all to see
what happened a week ago
I said some things I shouldn’t have
I let my heart speak instead of my head
letting my anger and red flurries get the best of me
what happened a week ago
is an awful lot like what happened 11 years ago
I’m six years old
piecing together a puzzle of forgiveness
walking back to my room after a yelling match with my sister
I scribble I’m so sorry I got mad at you on the back of my homework
slide it under her door
and wait

When you first found me
I was floundering
about to dive into the deepest waters I’d ever seen
I can’t swim very well
you threw me a life preserver, breathed purpose into my ashen lungs
I stumbled and fell you picked me back up
for a while, I was okay
I learned how to swim and I’ll even go as far to say I liked being in the water
but then the storms came and my arms were still too weak
I’m sinking
when people hurt me
I lash out
you do not get to treat me that way
an eye for an eye is what my brother used to say
I’m proud and loyal
you crossed me
I know life was never ******* fair
which is why I’m leaving
you do not get to hurt me anymore
I’ve been poisoned by your words they still sting
you started painting over your picture
little by little you became
just another unrecognizable face
thank you for the life lessons
I know who I am and who not to become
my head held high
trying not to cry
this is my goodbye

-z.z

i'm slipping in and out of consciousness
every breath gets harder and you are
sitting on the edge of my bed
watching me with tired eyes
in between my fluttering
heartbeats i see you
too i'm so
sorry
-z.z

i wish i knew how to turn this rage into passion
maybe then i'd stop being so destructive
i'm a ticking time bomb and a ******* ant
i'm the toddler crying for no reason i don't know what i want
do you realise how long it's taken me to look like i have my life in order i don't i never have
i'm one drop away from a hurricane destructive enough to shake up Red Cross
i'm dancing on the edge of a cliff
i'm speeding down a mountain road no barriers between me and an abyss of rocks and cacti
basically
the thing is though, i don't know how
i won't know how
i'm not 17
i'm simultaneously the
annoying three year old who can't stop asking why
and the 20something wondering if it was really worth it
one of these days i'll know the answers to the questions
i'm looking forward to that day
i hope it arrives before i have the chance to leave
-z.z

i'm caught in between
like a hamster running on a squeaky wheel
i'm not sure where i'm going
or if i'm even going anywhere
i want to go somewhere
but i don't know why
but i don't know where
but i don't know how to get off of this
****** wheel
i'm swallowing my excuses and they're making me choke
i'm in between layers and shades of colour too dark to be called
colour
i'm in between wanting and needing
speaking and whispering
living and dying
running and standing
breathing and
-
-z.z