Maybe if you leave, we can work it out.

I need a permanent blanket of nimbus clouds more oppressive than a Roman Catholic Court.

But, moving to London might convict me back to the cityscape of wasted Fridays and Saturdays.

Because without it, the Betrand Russell in me might just start to wake up. And then I’d remember - there has to be more to life than the 9 to 5 daze.

Washington DC stopped being fun after week two, and now I see it for what it is — a crush of desperate tourists blowing cigarette smoke in your face while you sweat last night’s drinks and Jumbo slice crash.

Anywhere that sells Nutella crepes is pretty sweet, and I love all the kite flyers and buskers festivals. I long ago realized that while Christiania has hundreds of market stalls, they’re all selling the same material things on a Groundhog Day loop: baked goods, stolen bikes, old furniture, cheap phones, and bags of open air hash.

Climbing up Carcassonne, a fortified medieval French town, probably is the best thing ever, but somehow, the two-hour lines to get into Berghain seem more worth it — all that dirt, grunge, and spinning feels as close to Dante’s Inferno; as close to feeling alive as it gets.

But now my Sunday afternoons are spent curled on top of my clean bedsheets, twitching about like a decapitated blue whale - batshit exhausted and depressed but somehow grinning like The Joker, wondering if sleep ever sets.

i'm constantly stuck between
bones and blood and amphetamines
i keep thinking that
i can have it all if i just find the right scene
and i can see toxic thoughts like toxic waste
contaminating the oceans of my mind
a bitter aftertaste, a better nursery rhyme
the glowing eyes of my demons
reflecting off the blade of a knife
and the half smiling rings on the coffee table
are the only things keeping me
company at night
i never thought i'd ever describe pain as
"bright"
"vibrant"
"almost warm in the right light"
i'm stuck here, falling apart
a glass object breaking in slow motion
becoming bones before tomorrow starts
fissures turn to fractures, an explosion
kids these days call that abstract art
who i am hates who i used to be,
and who i was always wanted to be
this
a human typewriter who knows
how everyone's stories begin and end
a tree limb that never breaks, only bends
the back end of a horse
a street with a dead-end
a best friend a godsend
wind me up and watch me pretend
turning circles and spitting up my
heart on my bedroom floor.
"this is as good as it gets, my friend."

my life.
me.
my place.
school.
pending job application.
All of it is so
overwhelming
I feel like if it all stopped-
rather if I stopped.
It wouldn't change anything.
It would make things move
smoother.
Definitely would be more cost effective
for my mother.
Just one less student to collect data from
to then be averaged into a system.
my purpose of
living is currently
aimless.
Going to high school for medical careers yet
my heart lies
between
lines.
Until I settle,
I'll keep riding my skateboard in the
same neighborhood and stay writing in the
same journal and keep loving the
same lover..

“A solider wandering alone
Around people in masks
Like an innocent soul surrounded by evil spirits
No longer alone just merits in lockets”

In the back of my notebook
I'm writing letters of sorrow
Not sure what to call unavoided Tacenda
Help me escape this hysteric agenda

As the ink bleeds out of my pen
And the tears run into pages undone
The fear of forgetting and being forgotton
It's the race I’ll never out run

For the plot of your life isn't your choice
Questioning desires and is it really your voice
Directions you take make no sense
Is it truly there only for suspense

By: Zoulaikha

Life stretches skywards
plucked by an unnamed child
and chewed for an hour or so
then dropped in a catatonic drool
I'm a worse person in my dreams,
which one am I really
contemplative harrumphing
cosmic fractals pose dramatically
but the paparazzi is focused elsewhere
when my hands cup dropping water
it's the same face half-veiled by fire
and the trance created by its traipsing limbs
leave the men in circuitous conversation

"We are defined by the choices we make."
How do we truly understand this sentence, then?
Is it the bottom of the beer bottle in which we find it?
Or the passionate afternoon with that red haired stranger?
Maybe perhaps that beautiful pointless death you bloomed within yourself.
In which case you smiled and said, "It's alright."
Maybe the breaking point was when you realised you spent conforming to avoid being branded otherwise.
Self-immolation isn't that much fun.
It began with a heart-burn.
And continued with a tussle for control within.
Til you realised you could no longer pretend you wanted both sides of the cake.
The hunter and prey.
Then you awoke.
And saw that you were no better, no less than the entirety of the roads you took.
Now this is where you made or broke.
A knife to the arm, a rope to the neck, a pill to wash it all away.
A cacophonous tremor rippling across your psyche.
And you realised.
"Do I deserve this future, death, life I've been craving for? Or are we always, sometimes monsters?"