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Aurora 23h
Here I am, struggling through the battle of life,
Fighting the monsters that live inside me.
I’m tired — I want to give up, I want to run.
But their ****** laughter still echoes in my head.
Every wound they gave still bleeds, the pain still fresh.
Something inside whispers, “Let go,” but now I see—
It was never me. It was their curse that clung to me.

Here I am, waging wars I was never meant to fight,
Bleeding from wounds I should never have carried.
The pain still knocks me down, again and again.
I escaped their grip the first time I spread my wings—
But why did I have to flee?
When my angels left, I had no one left to turn to.
My cries for help were drowned by the devil’s laughter.
I watched my angels bow to the dark — and hope abandoned me.

Here I am, looking back at the wreckage of my path,
Their voices still echo, loud in my mind.
All the pain, all the memories fuel this rage—
My heart, twisted, filled with hate.
My broken mind hates the one I love,
And loves the ones I wish I didn’t.
So I built a fortress around my heart,
Forged in hate, it shields me from life.

Now I’m alone—surrounded, but alone.
I want to break free.
But now I realize…
I have become my own captor.
And escape feels impossible.

But still, I’ll try.
I’ll keep going.
Because I can’t give up now.
She was born where the walls would tremble and sway,

Where love came in shouting, then drifted away.

Where silence could cut like a whispering blade,

And kindness was rare as the warmth of May.



Her mother drank storms and let them cascade

On young, aching shoulders, alone and afraid.

She never asked thunder to fall from the skies,

But still bore the weight under tear-salted eyes.



She learned that trust is a word carved out in stone-

Left out in the rain, eroded, alone.

She gave hers to hands that vowed to stay,

But they shattered her trust and then walked away.



At thirteen, her world didn’t fully fall down,

But something inside her refused to be found.

She stopped seeking mirrors, stopped seeking sound,

Felt sure that no soul would hear if she drowned.



Bur deep in the dark, she found ink and a page-

A space to release her quietest rage.

She wrote to survive, let sorrow flow,

To dream of a world where kind hands would grow.



word upon word, she built from the pain,

A self, made of fire, of hope, of the rain.

She grew-not just older-but fiercely and right,

A warrior shaped in the absence of light.



Now she’s a mother, a woman, a flame,

Who shields her own from sorrow and shame.

She listens, she holds, she stands strong and true,

Becoming the love, she never once knew.



The past still whispers, but cannot command;

It doesn’t define her, it doesn’t stand.

She writes-not to flee, but to chart the climb,

Each line a reminder: she rose every time.



She tells the girl hidden deep in her mind,

“We made it, we lived, we rose, and we shined.

The monsters are silent-they don’t get the end.

We write the last word, with strength as our pen.”
k May 6
i don’t have a bruise
not now
but my skin remembers

because once,
it rooted itself there
dark and sudden
from nothing at all

or maybe something small
that shouldn’t have hurt
but did

and since then
i’ve learned
not all pain
leaves a mark
but it lingers
just the same

now i know
that pain doesn’t always
ask permission
and not all wounds
warn you first

but now
i freeze

before hands even reach
before words even fall
like muscle memory
but for fear

and now
i tense
when i shouldn’t

i flinch
before anything happens

i wait
for the hit
even when no one’s swinging

because once,
he came without warning
and now
my body remembers
even when my mind
tries to forget

because once
was enough.

no harm
just shadows
and the ache
of almost

because healing
was never
watching the bruise fade
it was learning
that the skin can clear
and still wince
at nothing

still twitch
at the memory
of blue

still ache
where there is no mark

just learning
how to live
with the fear
of it all
returning

i flinch
at nothing

because once
there was something
and it stayed

i hold still
for what might not come

i tense
for what might not come

because it once did
and that was
enough.
Archer Apr 28
I can’t tell the difference between platonic
And romantic love
I’m sorry for believing you just meant to be
friendly
I’m sorry for believing that those touches were friendly
I’m sorry for enabling this by acting friendly
Maybe I just felt in need
Of a friend
STOP; Now that you're finished, you will now, forever be done;
For I have a chance now to grow, while your life from here will flop;

DROP; Did you get your rocks off, during your twisted, distasteful, fun?
Let the truth be known, let the confessions begin to flow!
YOU HAD NO RIGHT TO DO WHAT YOU DID TO ME EVEN:
IF I WAS WEARING SHORTS AND A CROP TOP!!

&ROLL; It's time I start helping to put people like you away!
It's time for myself, and more people to;
get the strength and the courage and the;
Ability and the freedom to open up and finally say;
WE ARE SPEAKING UP, AND GIVING OUT NAMES!!
WE ARE NO LONGER ASHAMED, FOR WE ARE NOT THE;
CAUSE OF YOUR PITIFUL SHAME!!!
WE ARE SPEAKING UP AND SEEKING JUSTICE AND REBORN INNOCENCE!!
If our lives have to be changed, then so does yours;
Perverts LIKE YOU DON'T DESERVE TO LIVE THE SAME;
IT"S TIME FOR PERVERTS LIKE YOU, TO;
BE DECAPITATED LIKE USELESS SERVANTS!

STOP; Your time has come to an end, no longer the sunlight you shall see;
Oh and trust me, you will be going to hell, nowhere near the heavens up top;

DROP; I will create my own valley because of disgraces like you;
You only gave myself and others the power, to finally set ourselves free;
We will gather together, and spread the words "NO AND STOP"

&ROLL; I hope the day you meet your final demise,
not one person has a tear to cry
And I hope not one person has the audacity to ask why
Because when we were too young, we lost ourselves and our innocents
BUT THAT'S ALL GOING TO CHANGE, BECAUSE;
WE ARE GOING TO START TAKING CONTROL!

Stephanie A. Ludwig
04/19/2025
(a poem in six stained glass windows)

I. BECOMING

I used to flinch when someone said
“You’re gonna be big someday,”
like—how big?
How loud?
How lonely?
How much of me
do I have to lose
to be loved that widely?

I kissed a boy once
just to see if I could still feel small.
I could.
then I wrote about it,
rhymed tongue with undone,
called it healing.

Some nights I Google myself
with the same hunger
you search a symptom.
Just hoping it’s not fatal.
Just hoping it is.
Just hoping there’s finally
a name for it.

My digital footprint is a shrine
to girls I outgrew but never buried,
their teenage poems
still written in Sharpie
on the back of my ribs.

My first book will ship with
a hand strung bracelet that says
“I survived myself.”

II. PERFORMING

Every time I tell the story
I’m a little more clever,
a little less heartbroken,
a little more
dangerous,
a little more wrong.

I have a bad habit
of leaving confessions in comment sections—
breadcrumbs on the internet floor,
for anyone sad enough
to mistake me
for a map.

I used to rehearse goodbyes in mirrors,
just to see if my eyes could lie
as well as my mouth did.
They could.
They still can.

They called me brave
for saying it out loud.
But I only said it
because the silence was louder.

The secret to staying soft
is deleting the parts
where I’m anything else.

I write best in hotel rooms
because they feel borrowed, too—
because no one expects
the towels to stay white
or the girl to stay quiet.

III. DISGUISING

“SENSITIVE” was printed on my sweatshirt
the night he told me
I hurt myself through him—
at least now he can’t say
I never gave a trigger warning.

Half of my closet is clearance rack chaos,
the other half is second-hand salvation—
each hanger a theory
of who I’ll be next.
Sometimes I dress like the version of me
I think he could’ve stayed for.

Every good body day feels like a plot twist,
like God gave me
a guest pass
to precious.

He said I was too much,
but whispered it like praise.
Now I underline his fears
in neon.

Some nights I still wake at 3:14
to texts I dreamt he sent—
all apologies
and no punctuation.

I screenshot compliments
like they’re prescriptions,
take two every six hours,
pray my body doesn’t reject them.
One day, I’ll ask the pharmacy
if they carry praise
in extended-release.

Every dress in my closet whispers
“wear me to his funeral,”
but he keeps refusing to die,
so I just overdress for brunch—
and sit facing the door
just in case.

IV. SEARCHING

I footnoted the grief.
Added asterisks to all my ‘I’m fine’s.'
Even my browser history
reads like a ******* fire.

My greatest fear isn’t that I’ll fail—
it’s that someday I’ll win
and realize the trophy feels
exactly like loneliness,
but heavier.

I read horoscopes for signs of relapse,
Googling “Do Libras experience nostalgia?”
at 5:15 a.m. like a drunk astrologer
pleading with the stars
to cut me off.

I used to edit Wikipedia pages
for characters who reminded me of myself,
changing their endings to
“she survives,”
“she gets out,”
“she burns the diary.”
They banned my IP
for excessive optimism.
I took it as a compliment.

V. RECKONING

The girls who follow me online
all think I have answers.
I don’t.
I have questions in fancy fonts
and delusions of grandeur
dressed as advice.

My therapist asks me to describe “progress,”
and I show her unsent messages,
leftover pills,
and a notebook filled with
poems written in my sleep—
and one that woke me up
Screaming.

Some of you highlight my breakdowns
like they’re quotes.
I get it.
I do it too.

VI. ALONE

My brain is a group chat
of all the selves I've ghosted,
texting in all caps
and sending GIFs that scream,
"Remember when you thought you'd be happy by now?"

If this poem goes viral,
tell them I made it big.
Tell them I got loud.
Tell them I wasn’t lonely.
Just alone
by design.
Like all cathedrals are.
This is the cathedral I built with what was left.
A six-part spiral. A myth I wrote to outlive myself.
Let me know which window you walked through first.
Aditi Apr 18
I wonder if you have scars,
To me, they would shine as if stars.
The luminaires without which
the night sky would be melancholic.
You are Imperfectly Perfect;
this might sound a little hyperbolic.

I wonder if you hate those cuts,
The ones that you shrouded with all your gut.
They are not scars, but stories.
Marking on the frame of your soul, a territory.
You are Perfectly Imperfect;
I hope you know what this reflects.

Time heals all wounds,
and leaves the scars.
How else would you know,
that you are a survivor?
If you have ever struggled with scars (could be from anything), then this one id for you. I hope nothing for you but to feel secure in your own body. I want to tell you that the scars don't make you worth any less. The only thing they make you is Unique. So make sure to wear with your head held high. I hope the hard times pass soon and you get better!
Joshua Phelps Apr 15
i. descent

three years of
trial and tribulation

three years of
self-pity
and regret

i kept asking:
is there something
wrong with me?

am i my own
worst enemy?

am i my own
biggest threat?

three years ago,
i thought
i lost it all

a fall from grace
that put me
to the test.

ii. decision

i had
two options:



fail


or


try my best


to not be
a part of
the problem

to let the past
be the past

and
lay it all
to rest.

iii. healing

as the years
went by,

i learned
to break free

i learned
to forgive my
past

so the bad dreams
could finally
drift away

and i
can finally

be at peace,

at last.
a soft rebellion against who i used to be—
this poem is for the nights i almost gave up,
and the mornings i didn’t.
Evie Mar 27
They say I am the survivor.
I am able to walk
I am able to talk, but i cannot speak my truth
I watch a kid lose his life in the mental facility
I am supposed to just be a survivor
I watch kids get stabbed with colored pencils and strangled with headphones
I watched multiple suicide attepts.
Kids ran away or refused to leave.
The mental hospital kills, and it is an epidemic
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