no more speaking
i know you love to drown me in your words
but hush
breathe me in
let the silence fill the room like oxygen
embrace the nothing
let my lips tell silent stories
hold still and you may understand

when you touch me i am pink lemonade in the fall
your fingers whisper promises on my skin
i believe each one

you are the rumble of thunder
danger and pain and power and thrill
yet strangely comforting
you make my insides feel happy and cozy
but full of adrenaline
a perfect mixture of feelings I never knew I needed
you are the opposite of love
you are cold and bitter like stormy winds
but inside you make me feel something that resembles love
and that feeling strikes me with electric fear
as hard as I try, I cannot get rid of it
so I will embrace it
I will lay in the grass with my arms above my head
my shirt unbuttoned halfway so the rain can kiss my skin
and the lightning can dance closer and closer
I know the pain it will bring me
but I don’t care
I am going to enjoy this life while I have it

my heart is too full and too empty all at once
I have too much love to give and not enough space to receive
I worry too much
my head is always spinning
always plucking the petals off of flowers
they love me, they love me not…
and yet
I continue to fall in love
constantly
even after having my heart broken
over
and over
and over
until I no longer remember what it feels like to be loved
only to give love away until I am an empty balloon
lying helpless on the ground
alone

I cannot tear my eyes away from the sky
they are bound together with needle and thread
although I do not mind

I will never grow tired of her amber glow in the mornings
her cerulean hue mid afternoon
and her cotton candy pinks and purples in the evenings
but my favorite has always been the night sky

I am in love with the milky white face of the moon
and the glittery speckles of stars
creating swirls of silver and white
on a canvas of black

I often venture outside late at night
just to see her
she is the Juliet to my Romeo
a beautiful masterpiece I have always loved
but am unable to touch

triggered
you laugh as you say the word. this is all a joke to you
of course, there’s no harm to your fun
triggers are just excuses
of course

triggered
my trauma has become a prison
I cannot walk down the street without remembering
the things he did
my hands are always shaking
my eyes are always watering

triggered
you tell me to pull myself together
it was just a joke, no big deal
but believe me, I’m trying
I have been trying for years
holding yourself together is not nearly as easy as it sounds

triggered
my skin is quicksand
the more I struggle, the tighter it becomes
it is crawling with spiders and cockroaches
I am overflowing
my body is too small to hold so much worry

triggered
I do not need your approval to know that my panic is real
but
if you tell me I do not belong in your universe
with all the people who can laugh and play and trust each other
with the people who hear the word *triggered and laugh
chances are, I will believe you