unless you've felt like a ghost
condemned to haunt its own body,
unless you've ever prescribed
self-destruction as self-medication,
unless vulnerability means only telling
half your story because that's enough
to get everyone to stop asking,
unless being told "you're just like your dad"
is your greatest fear,

don't tell me you understand.

*–w.b.h.

I do not know
if things will be okay,
but I know
that things will go on,
and that's enough
to keep going.

*—w.b.h.

she inspires masterpieces
and orchestrates symphonies.
how is it that she
is both oil and canvas?
torn sketchpads and
rough drafts spattered in red ink,
these run through her veins.
she is not imperfect—
only revising.

—w.b.h.

Roses
Are sprouting
From the crevices
Of the
Skeleton’s
Cold, bony body.

The wings
Which flutter
From the butterflies
Dance round
Enclosed by
Its thin, fragile ribs.

Weeping
From strangers
Stifles evening air.
The bones
Laid hidden
For some twenty years.

They cry
For woman
Unknown to us all.
Disguised
To us all
In her final rest.

Dare not
The police
To disturb her corpse.
Detached,
At the edge
Of the crowd I stand.

There is
Death in this
Damp sanctuary,
Haven
Of beauty
It is no longer.

Death is
So ghastly,
Decay so putrid.
Yet the
Atrophy
Remains so lovely.

I left,
Unabashed,
With silent musing.
It was
There I thought
That hope still remains.

Life was
Still gleaming
From Death’s rotted cage
Leaving
Strands of dreams
For those still living.

you don't need to trace your hands
over the hairline fractures of their bones
to know their body was once betrayed.
you don't need to hold their wrist tighter
just to feel the pulse of a reassembled heart.
their past is not an imperfection,
and they are not in need of saving.
remain mindful that they are a person—
no more or less whole than any other—
and they are not condemned to a life
within the confines of their past.
so fall in love with their eyes,
their heart, their words—
their present.

–w.b.h. // a letter for broken lovers

Fingers intertwine,
all hills and valleys,
weaving together to form
the most intricate of landscapes.
The valleys, they quiver,
and the hills, they shake—
unsure of their own design.
And she is there.
She is the horizon.
She is all there is to see—
that distant enigma
that never seems to grow closer.
She is, in herself, sufficient.
She is crude, yet refined;
rebellious, yet conforming.
Dark and light coexist in her.
She is a myriad of contradictions.
She is whoever she desires to be
at any given moment.

-w.b.h.