So many poems
and stories
have gone unwritten
due to fear of not being good enough

She controls her laughter,
lets it slip from the edge of her mouth,
the corners of her lips lift ever so slightly,
then, she makes a sound,
seamlessly, her fingers graze my thighs,
smoothly, her eyes meet mine,
and in her eyes, I see my reflection—
aflame, abashed, and fiery,

She is the answer I’ve scoured the world for,
and yet, she, herself, remains a mystery,

Ah, I see,
She controls her laughter
as easily as she controls me.

My entire life,
I have been waiting.
For years,
Almost two decades now
I have been waiting.
Waiting,
For the better parts.
Waiting,
For the “soon”.
Waiting,
For my life to begin.
Because,
I don’t feel like I have lived.
In the nearly twenty years
I have been alive
And breathing
I do not feel
In any of those years
That I have been alive.
I don’t feel like a single breath
That I have taken
Has been real.
I feel as if
All these years
I’ve been stuck
Behind a window
Watching as my life unfolds
Before me.
I feel that
I have had
Zero control.
That I am in the backseat
Letting someone else drive.
That someone else,
Is writing on the pages
Of MY life.
But no more.
I will break that window,
I will take that wheel,
And I will write
My own pages.
My life has begun,
And now -
I’m in control.

You never think it'll hit you like it does,
headlines, top stories, dead classmates.
Subtle news that causes an earthquake,
rumbling through your chest.

It's not your everyday story,
but it seems it's becoming that way.
"Overdosed on ******", I read,
but it doesn't surprise me.

Just another soul the Devil grasped,
torn from the heart and left to pass,
another good man broken down,
another motherless child in doubt.

Another headline gone ignored,
another cry for help lost,
in the drowning sound of the thousands,
trapped beneath the crippling disease.