Enough glass analogies for me
Your sharps words are your apology
Even though I’m yelling at ghosts
You are what makes me hate ME the most

I hate the rocks I carry for you
The heavy stones you used
To smash me into pieces

I was gonna say broken
But broken parts can  be fixed
And I’m yelling at ghosts
I’m screaming at the smoke

That’s not a few stitches
It’s a lifetime of surgery
Piecing together the old memory of who I’m supposed to be

It’s a lifetime of being soaked
Naked with no clothes
Drowning in the rain that always came
The predictability is what killed me
But most times it was your name

I keep saying you
I have no clue who I’m referring to
Just a big monster taking up space in my brain
A collection of mementos colored by pain

“Sleep is for the weak. But the beautiful? They need all they can get, so that they still
got somethin’ to pay the bills with in the mornin.’”
Or at least that’s what they told me.

I passed tired barrelling down the interstate in a cast-off Intrepid
puffing out more fumes than a ‘50s Ad Executive burning out on Wall Street.

Ain’t no rest for the overqualified millennial, banking in permanent
intern status day after day, smiling for their twenty-four nightly viewers.

Getting to the finish line at the end of each calendar month requires great
effort to haul drooping limbs and scaling flesh across the kitchen to turn the page.

White-knuckled, crusty-eyed, and chapped lips inching up towards a reluctant smile,
I brushed the dandruff from fraying strands, but my supervisor saw my holey sweater.

What they don’t know is that the polyester stained uniforms they deduct from
my paycheck each month doesn’t leave much for the increasing expense of mental health.

But that doesn’t stop the tidal wave of oil painted daydreams each lunch hour
as employees pass around leather belts and used needles, getting their caffeine fix.

I wish I could tell you,
Just how tired I am.
But the word tired is not strong enough.
Exhaustion would make it sound as if I had been running marathons.
Yet even sitting in my room all day,
I am exhausted by noon.

The moment I awake in the morning
With the sun rising, the warmth on my skin
and butterflies flying, birds chirping away the day.
As soon as I open my eyes to the trees in view,
I am tired again.

I can sleep all night and never make a sound.
I could sleep like a rock, and still.
I am so tired.

I am tired when I am alone
and I am drained when I am not.
I am tired of fighting myself all day long.
I am tired of being tired.

Even though I want to say hello,
I am too tired to engage.
I am too tired to stand up for myself,
or interject to correct.
I am sorry my being tired gets in the way.

It gets in the way every single day.

I've seen how beautiful you bloom
That's why I work so hard for you
I've seen the power of your flourish
That's why I stick around
Even though you pierce me
That's why I bleed so nice for you
But all my hopes and dreams are memories
That I tried to plant on snowy grounds