Do you know what it’s like
To be caged by your brain
A place supposed to be free
To be who you are
Graced with heaven or hell
To be changed by so little
Torment yourself wholly
To be what is right
It doesn't stop at your mind
To be in rambling circles
        Losing your breath
        To be at the mercy of fear
        Shaking ever so carefully
To be seen merely as cold
Digging into Earth you call skin
To be laced with liquid iron

I’m scared of crushing people with my feelings. It seems that though I have this armor of mine that protects me from theirs, are they safe from mine?

I constantly ask people if I ever overwhelm them, and luckily, they always say
“you don’t”
I just wish believing them was as easy as breathing, if only my mind and I could be civil and agree that everything is indeed fine, they don’t want me gone, with all the certainty that they carry in their pockets, “stay.” but sometimes I know I can be insufferable and I don’t know what to do about it.

Feelings find shelter in my chest, feelings are all I’ve ever known, who am I, if not made of feelings. I’m worried it will slowly start to suffocate people, so I silently **** myself trying to push them away, in the hopes of saving them from drowning.

People from the past are victims of my feelings being too much of a burden to carry, so they leave, or I leave? I never truly know.

If you hurt me, it’s fine, at least you’ll no longer bear with carrying what I have to give, what I can’t give, my mind, 9 missed calls, unsent letters and everything else that weighs on your shoulder. I however will sit here in silence, looking into familiarity, as time and time again, I have and always will be seeing this coming.

— Ulia G.

Aching to sink further into the dirt
Into the grave, you built while pacing back and forth
Manifesting the prophecies you work so hard to avoid
Wrapped up in soiled stories of what could be,

You linger on the branches of a willow’s weep
Swinging from each somber lullaby into feathers that soar
Into the minds covered in clouds resting on the top of the world
Clarity is misguided when there’s more fun to be had amid the fog

Picking at the scab you know will bleed
You crave to reopen the wounds you know not to be ready
Eager for a dance against Time,
He laughs at your foolish attempts to hurry

Burning
Yearning
In my heart
It's deserving
To be heard.
Body's whispers
Become screams.
Thought streams,
Where are their hot springs?
Body-mind connection
Currently a hurtful interaction,
Heaviness inside.
Whether the mind's full or empty-
Hard to tell,
The spiral repeats,
Energy depletes,

As if under a
Spell,
Leaving the body
A heavy but empty,
A burning but cold,
A lifeless but longing
A hard but soft
Shell.

I may not be that old,
Been sixteen for a little over a week,
But I know,
That time is painfully fleeting.
Those routines I adore,
Grind life away to a paste,
Though I may deplore,
I don’t want all this time to be a waste.
Everywhere I turn,
Always pushing me to look to the future.
I see that I crash and burn,
Thoughts that make require sutures.
Forcing me to face the inevitable,
That my childhood will soon be gone,
I wish I could be a rebel,
Run away and come back at the dawn.
Time keeps ticking,
Time keeps slipping,
From me.
Keep growing older,
As time moves slower,
And everything I see,
Keeps fading.

Childhood memories,
Haunting me,
As houses are built,
On sacred land.
Two years left,
Till things start to leave my hands.
No amount of distraction,
Is ever enough,
It just delays the action,
And makes the truth more rough.
How it hurts,
To see my childhood drying up.
How it burns,
That expectations rise while I cry my eyes out,
Cause I don’t want to accept that time’s wasting,
I want things to stay the same,
And I hate that they are changing.
If I could stop time and keep everything as is,
You’d have to give me a good reason to take the next step.
For the fear of failure,
Outweighs all the good I see,
Too many possibilities.
People talk me up,
An excuse to disappoint,
Sometimes I don’t even know who I am,
Yet, they seem to have a point.
Days turn to weeks turn to months long gone,
Can never get them back,
And time doesn’t let you mourn,
We just keep on keeping on,
And hope you don’t get left behind.
All this fear holds me back,
Like the chains in my tower,
I want to break free,
But instead, I cower,
Tell myself I’m getting better,
While the results are nowhere to be found.
I stay looking envious at the ground,
While other people excel and move forward,
I’m stuck at the start,
Overcomplicating where to walk.
I’m up high in the sky,
Stuck in the middle of the beanstalk,
Too afraid to climb back down,
And too afraid to reach for the stars,
For what if I fall?
What if I fly?
Do I have the gall,
To even try…?

Growing older isn’t fun,
But it’s just a part of life,
Don’t know where I’m going,
I’ll find out in due time.

It’s hard to make sense of the noise.
There are just some places
That makes it hard to exist, to breathe.
And the world feels too close.

I’m haunted by the thought
Of forgetting everyone’s smile.
Some moments just feel blurred,
Especially when it all feels too much.

But between the chaos,
There are glimpses of something softer.

A smile,
a second that could slip away,
But not quite.

A moment
Trying to forge itself in my head,
In a hope to be remembered.

I worry a lot,
And I know I need to stop,
But I can't just leave anxiety,
It's a human instinct inside of me.

I worry for your safety,
I worry for mine,
It's a cold world out there,
Without enough fire to keep us all warm.

So if you're struggling,
Please confide in me,
I worry so much for you,
For your happiness.