if my life was a book

I don't think I'd want to read it

the plot would be repetitive

and I'd get too bored to finish

a cycle of me loving,

me caring,

me wanting (really, deeply)

then me on my own and doing nothing

the moment I shut the door to my bedroom

always the same thing

shutting down, stepping away,

closing my eyes

sinking down in a puddle of blankets and guilt

until I work myself into a panic

because why am I still doing nothing

I could do anything I want

(a minute ago I wanted so much)

now I can't

seem

to care

I don't want to live this anymore

still I know it'll always be the same

she looks so perfect

under the lights.

beautiful lovely glowing

my skin is writhing aching itching pining

when I reach up to scratch it it peels away

revealing my too many lies

to them

to me

lies saying I can do this.

.

.

oh. you poor thing.

you actually thought you could.

be like her.

shining inwardly beneath that spotlight

look at you cowering

there on the edge

trying hopelessly to fill the space

the lights burning through you

carve out a silhouette in the shape of a girl

empty hollow shadowed.

wanting

wanting to be her

wanting her

she's so pretty

I'm so.

.

.

clawing scratching fading

stripped of my skin under the lights

my deepest raw bleeding organs

spilling out in front of an audience

flakes of skin drifting off to the floor to reveal a miserable someone

pretending she could be powerful

part of something.

as if.

tissue and tendons,

water and blood,

bones hanging limply in their cushions of muscle,

heart beating numbly in its skeletal cage.

eyes take in light, blindly process

the stream of information we call the world

after all music is nothing more than sound

after all laughter's made of nothing but air

circuits and wires,

a perfect machine,

each part is calculated to keep us surviving

nothing more than electric waves in our brain

just a steady stream of blood through our heart

and somehow, impossibly, it all comes together

and it turns into something new called

life

I think I'm

starving

the more I eat

the hungrier I am

there's no satisfaction

while I drown myself

in sugar, salt and oil

my body deteriorates

and I tell myself

I'm starving

and I want just a little

more

The storm is gone,

and in its wake,

the earth seems too green to be true-

all verdant trees, their leaves aglow

and dripping with green dew.

It's bright and warm and alive again

with newborn sunlight piercing through

the tired clouds we left behind

I never liked the color green,

but today, I think, might change my mind.

Wait while I tear this silvered cords of empty enjoyment

Out from their resting place in my brain.

Wait while I rip the stubborn strands that hold my eyes

To their post on the screen

I'd look away,

Look at you,

Look at the world,

And at my life that's sitting

Waiting on my bedside table

But I'm afraid they're buried in too deep now

If I look away, these

Silver cords and

Smiling faces and

Empty jokes and

Dulling colors would

Tear my brain out with them.

So wait, while I rot here.

Won't you wait?

Just a moment?

While I pluck my thoughts out

One by one

There goes anger

Care and love

Joy goes next

Off runs sadness

Look who's left now

Apathy

Numbness.

At least my eyes aren't tied to the screen anymore

No, I think

They're there by choice now

Look so gold in the sunlight

The color of love

Joy

Life

I've always been told

Eyes are windows to the soul

So it's made me wonder

Why mine are so blue

It felt like when I was a kid

And the lights went out in my room

I would stumble through my familiar surroundings

Made foreign by the sudden darkness

And when I reached for the one thing

I could always count on to bring back the light

It was unresponsive.

After midnight, but not quite dawn,

The stars on their strings, puppeteered by the moon.

Two wild things beneath the October sky

Tracing trails of laughter through the silver streets.

They clasped hands and spun till the world was a blur

And shouted in the wind that they'd always be friends

Then they sat in the grass and looked up to the sky

And their lilting voices were magic in the air.

And their laughter was music, and their dreams were concrete,

And in that hour between night and day,

They dreamed to dance among the stars.

And then, the sky fell, or they flew up to meet it

And the stars were in their eyes, and seemed close enough to touch.

There was nothing but them, and the sky, and a song

In that hour between the midnight and dawn.

Just a stranger in the far-off mist

Orange lantern-glow in the sigh of the wind.

Two lives intersecting here, crossing paths tonight.

Both peering through the smoke-filled sky

Searching for a life that's glowing in the distance.

Just two strangers in the mist together,

Sharing their lives, if only for a moment.

Becoming friends while the lanterns glow.