The first “hello,” a waving hand
We’re only seats apart
“How do you do? Wanna be friends?”
That’s how it used to start
Expired words, still on my tongue
The words I wish to hear
Now changed from days when I was young
To whispers in my ear,
“All this is fake, so shallow too.”
“You sure you’re really friends?”
“I bet they just put up with you,
Cause you help meet the ends.”
The questions dragged up from my mind
I’ll tell the moon at night
And search alone, hope I can find
The answers to my plight
Tomorrow when the dark retreats
I know I’ll call you friend
I hope you’ll do the same for me
Even if you just pretend

I know you think you’re only beautiful in the dark,
like the moon, meant to be adored from afar, in shadows.
And maybe the stars whisper this to you,
but stars are only brave when no one’s watching
they fade as soon as the world fills with light.
Why take advice from something that hides with the dawn?

Your light comes from the sun, not from borrowed reflections.
You’re meant to stand in full view, to claim your space in the day.
Only the sun is your equal.
So why listen to stars that doubt their own strength?
Why let them convince you
that your worth is only real in the quiet of night

It happens with all the holes and wounds: they grow their own face, mend their gap, heal their rifts - those new skills of yours are but entities that emerge: to give shelter, to stand guard, replace the old, thicken the crust, weather this human storm - through and through.

But will the skin ever return to its soil? It linger on forevermore.
How tight is its grip? How hardened its sappy brooks? When will it nourish those delicate roots anew?

These thoughts arise as doubt breaks free. It pours and flows as I gaze down and lower still. Shadows seep and leak as the wheel spins and drills the soul evermore hollow. Anonymous is our tree of life, but it keeps faces in store.

For it happens with all the holes and wounds: they bleed, they mend, they heal - and what don't they do as I stand here, as I bend, as I kneel - as I carve their seats in shapes of departure. These skills thicken under my feet like growling tremors.

My past was but a dream - ready to slide and crumble like a leaf.
My weariness is universal. My knowledge, heavy. There cannot be a conclusion. I am growing thin.

Let me feed those roots anew.

i finally feel welcome
and yet, it's not
the welcome i
truly want

it's like spike hugs
or poisonous kisses
the midas touch
withering sunlight

i feel almost too much
at ease now, as if
they have never thought
of me as anything other
than weak