She tells you that you were alone.
Static fills your head,
Air drains from your lungs.
She tells you that you were alone,
That you've always been alone.
You've never needed anyone.

You believe her
Because there's no one here.
There's never been anyone here.
Or, at least,
That's what she's told you.

She's written your whole life down in black and white,
Smooth, looping cursive on thick, yellowed parchment,
Wrapped up in soft leather,
and you swear you've met her before
but you've never seen her in your life.

There's a letter on your desk that no one wrote
and no one sent.
Because you've never known anyone,
you've never had anything.
It's not important,
So you burn it all down,
Your head hurts and you think that maybe you’ve forgotten something,
Someone important.

You can’t find it in you to care that the flames have caught in your skirt,
because there’s a warm hand encasing yours,
(Although you cannot see who it belongs to)
And there’s a heart beat in the back of your mind that tells you

You are so, very loved.

You are not forgotten.

You have never been alone.
Not even now.

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dtz'aj fqbfdx iwjfry ytt rzhm ktw dtzw tbs ltti.
pdbeh brx'uh guhdplqj ri ph.
zrxogq'w wkdw eh lurqlf.
.-.. --- ...- . / -.-- --- ..- --..--
.- .-.. .-- .- -.-- ... --..-- / .- .-.. .-- .- -.-- ...
..-. --- .-. . ...- . .-. ;

I hurt.
There are no other words to describe it- at least not while my head is pounding and my bones are shaking.
My skin covered in gaping wounds, bruised and blackened until I do not recognize myself
My bones, broken.
I hurt.
It hurts worst of all to know that there is not an end to my pain,
that even when I sleep I ache all over,
blood oozing from cuts and scrapes and caking my skin as it dries.
I hurt.
She is a healer,
all sunshine and sugar,
tea made with honey,
She has a voice soft as silk and her hands are calloused and cool against my feverish skin.
I hurt, still,
She cannot fix what I have broken,
She cannot heal my injuries,
but she tries.
I have been to healers before her,
all of which have given up when they realize I am a lost cause,
the gaping wounds spread out across my skin will never heal,
they leave to pursue a life they can save,
an affliction they can heal.
She does not give up,
her tired hands gently press a bandage to my cuts,
clean my wounds,
and sew them up.
It is not much,
it will not stop the flow of blood,
or the waves of pain,
but she will press her gentle lips to my forehead,
and do it again in the morning.
She is so sweet to me,
all the tender relief of a cool seaside breeze
and I love her.

I find a small comfort in those slow Sunday afternoons
when time moves like thick molasses,
the sun shines through my window
and fills me with warmth
when the universe feels so much bigger than me,
and you,
and all of this.
I can rest easy,
curl up into a blanket of safety,
knowing that nothing I do matters.
The things I choose to do or not do will not alter the course of the universe,
will not be significant beyond my own small corner of space and time.
The joy I find in the curl of my hair,
or the comfort of this chair,
matter only because I matter to me.

There are no monsters here.
We are not pristine or pure
But neither are we ***** or sinful.
I let my feet touch the ground.
Stable and secure.
There are angels all around me.
Dark grey eyes and soft pink lips.
Hands that softly wrap around your waist,
Wings that can swallow you whole,
Feathers of bright colours and hearts to match.
We are here,
Innocent and free
Bright and beautiful
We are not ashamed of the scars that litter our hearts and skins
The battles we have fought,
No matter if we won or lost
Are why we have found ourselves here
Where bright colours are beautiful
And our scars fill us with pride.
There are angels all around me
But what makes them angels
Is what made them human.

It is true that
The hyacinth flowers on the hill
Will be trampled and muddied
By the calloused, bare feet of all who tread there
Until they are dead and rotted
But I ask you to find a place
Where the streams flow rapidly,
Harsh and unforgiving,
Dangerous enough so that no man will dare cross,
No hand may pluck you from the ground
And grow there.
Next to the water of the stream,
In the midst of all else good and holy,
Safe from the reaches of men,
You will grow,
Bright purple and untarnished,
Stunning in your own right
And I will walk the dead hill,
I will try and brave the harsh waters,
If only to see you with my own eyes.

Breathe in,
My hands shake
Pins and needles in my head
And in my fingertips
Breathe in,
You've got it under control
I lie to myself,
Breathe out,
Pretending like I'm sovereign over my own body,
The silence crashes in my ears like waves,
All I can hear are my own ragged breaths
Breathe out,
Steady, slowly
Just catch your breath.
Now faster, quickly
And once you realize you've lost control,
Hold your breath.

She remembers the first time she watched him leave
She remembers the way her voice shook as she exhaled
And as she watched him turn the corner
She asked with trembling hands and a fast beating heart,
"Does this ever get easier?"
And no one answered.
She was alone,  
Save for the cold breeze biting at her bones
And the deep purple sky filling her lungs
She closed her eyes.
That was then.
And now,
This is the last time she will ever say goodbye to him.
It's different this time.
A proper goodbye,
Bittersweet and all.
She turns the corner, looking back at him once more
She watches him as she leaves
Drowns in his smile one final time
Listens to the sound of his laughter, although it makes her heart clench
And while she doesn't believe in silver lining,
She thinks that perhaps someone can smooth out the rough edges of life.
Not him.
He warms her up from the inside out
But he burns when she gets too close.
He makes her cheeks turn pink
And her hands blister.
She exhales.
The sands of time flow through her hands,
Days turn to years,
Memories fade,
But the constant flow of time between her fingers is almost comforting
Life moves fast,
And everything has now come to a close
But for the first time in a long time
She thinks she's okay with that.

Free at last, she breathed into the cold night air
Alone in her relief, although she is aware of all who are watching
With her small, strong hands she holds indescribable power
She holds a true kind of freedom,
an everlasting flame that warms her on the coldest nights
She smiles, bright as the stars and real as the ground on which she stands
The air no longer clouds her lungs, but clears them with every inhale
She is no longer lost,
She is found,
Not by a person, but by the universe itself
It holds her tightly with its gentle winds that run through her hair like hands
and soft skies that give her a home no matter where she goes
She relaxes into it's caring embrace, like a child back to her mother
The taste of liberation is sweet on her lips,
Like heavy rain after a drought
Her laughter rings like a bell,
Loud and clear even from miles away
Welcome home,
The universe tells her.
With the cosmos to guide her safely
And the promise of deliverance before her
She takes the first step back home.

I am nothing groundbreaking.
I am not earth shattering.
As a matter of fact, it would be difficult to distinguish me in a crowd
From everyone else.
I will not be anymore signicant than anyone else
When the sun explodes
When the world ends
When the universe shatters
But oh sweet irony,
That I will know all this and continue to believe
Somewhere deep down in my heart,
Where the ignorance in humanity lies
That I am somehow different
That everything I do matters to anyone but me
Simply on the principle that I see the world through my eyes alone.

What does it mean to be human?
Does it mean that your body is flesh and bone?
My body is made of plastic.
What are you made of?
What makes a person whole?
Is it fulfillment? Happiness? Soul?
Whatever the case, I am not whole.
Are you?
Are humans intelligent or ignorant?
I am both.
Which one are you?
Are humans kind or wicked?
I do not know which one I am.
Do you know?
Do humans get to choose who they are?
I have tried to mould myself as best I can, into the person I want to be
Have you?
Are you human?
I am, decidedly, not human.
I am that which I do not know of
I am that which I do not wish to discover
I hope never to know who I am.
Who are you?

He looked like heaven
And smelled like spring turning into summer
And maybe you left because you knew you didn't belong there
Maybe you know your place in the realm of the dead,
You certainly have the ambition to get there
And it feels too much like home, so much so that
You know that you could explore every corner of the universe with him
And never find anywhere like here.
Although the city keeps you up at night,
The sound of people weeping and gnashing their teeth in the streets
You throw yourself into the fire
"Burn me!" You cry, and you are burned.
"Cleanse me!" You wail, and you are made blind
Because there is not way for you to unsee what you have seen,
Except maybe forgetting what the world looks like
Plunged into eternal darkness
With only the scorching, dry heat of the flame
The sound of pain outside your window
And the ghost of the smell of spring turning into summer.
Tell me that you detest the memory of his eyes,
Tell me you do not cling to them like a lifeline.
He is roses and quick fingers.
He is bright eyes and a sharp smile.
He is the scent of spring turning into summer
He is heaven but this is home.

A curious mind cuts the tape on a dust covered box
Hands grasping at memories, that which was lost to the tale of time
Fate plucks something out of the box,
A cassette tape.
He listens to the naive voice of his younger self
He smiles, a fragile, nostalgic thing
And then he hears them,
The shadows that used to haunt the corners of his vision
The monsters that used to lay under his bed and outside of his locked door
His hands grasp for something from now, a piece of the new reality he's created
But all he can feel is dust.
He is not who is used to be
He is no longer scared
He is strong and smiles wide and easily
His voice is steady now and never breaks
His hands don't shake,
His scars are healed
He is different.
But deep in the back of his mind he knows that he is not all that different,
He still locks his doors at night
And flinches at loud noises.
Boxes are sealed shut, and shoved in the back of closets for a reason.
They are filled with little but skeletons and dust.
Open at your own risk.

Stick my veins with pins and needles
Fill my blood with poison
They'll pretend not to notice the ever growing circles under my eyes
Or how my skin get paler with each passing day
Let them pretend
Let them whisper their concerns behind closed doors
Open me wide and fill me with malady
Take up your knife with a close precision
And cut me out of my body
Let my spirit rest in the stars
Take away my earthly pains
With your head held high
And the bittersweet taste of indifference on your lips
(Bitter for me, sweet for you.)
Pour death into my bones,
Don't cease or falter when my eyes flutter shut and my lungs seize up
Let my heart beat slow and my mind go numb.

Through no fault of hers,
Her hands were fire
And her gaze was ice
Through no bad intentions
She watched me crumble under her fingers
Her soft hands scorched my skin
Through no rhyme or reason
Her smile was twisted
And her hand on my shoulder
Was enough to crush me

She stands alone.
She feels her universe fall apart at her feet, her second chance destroyed
The cracks in the floor taunt her, expanding and giving way to the stars.
She is falling apart, cracking and shattering under the pressure of space.
She misses him, misses the way he smiled easily and never failed to make her laugh
Without him everything feels hollow and empty,
Some days she can barely remind herself why she ever even tried
But then she remembers his warm eyes
He was beautiful, starry eyed and full of hope in the face of death
Maybe it was good he was gone, she would never have to see him break.
She would never have to see him shatter under the cold fingertips of the universe.
But in all truth perhaps the only reason he didn't crack when she did
Was that he was already in pieces.
Maybe they hung on for each other
Maybe they can let go now.
She looks at the world around her
She sees, for the first time the beauty he saw in everything
She smiles, bittersweet and tragic
She will die here,
He will die somewhere else.
Fine.

Hail falling like
Rocks
Weighed down by gravity
There and then
Gone
Melted on the ground
The same as the ones before it
I am hail
I am falling fast
Gravity pulling, wind
Blowing and
Praying I never
Melt