Poetry

The call passes midnight without announcing it. Someone laughs at something from fifteen minutes ago, because the conversation keeps looping back like a screensaver. Our phones glow like night-lights we pretend we outgrew. Nobody is talking now. Just the soft electricity of someone charging their phone, the sound of someone breathing through two layers of speaker, and the occasional “wait—are you—” that never finishes. The call timer climbs like it’s trying to reach something

they arrive. first five minutes: “hi…” “hey…” hands hover awkwardly, like perched birds. I don’t know if I should hug, wave, or just stare. laughter is polite, careful, not quite the kind that cracks your chest. then, ten minutes later: something snaps. someone trips over a word, someone else makes a dumb joke, and suddenly we’re elbows in ribs, stories spilling faster than we remember. the dam bursts. we are loud, messy, laughing like we’ve known each other forever --- becau

do you love yourself? well ? do you? or do you tolerate the trembling echo of your own reflection, shivering in the glass, while dust settles  in long-ignored corners, like tiny tombs of promises you swore you'd love again everyone says “fake it till you make it” — but do you? does it work? do you even want it to? will you ever be happy, staring in the mirror, tracing the cracks you imagine, hating every refracting angle, waiting for the glass to break? does the image bleed,

I press play. morning light slips through the blinds. five minutes till the bus. I count the beats, tap the table, muttering the lyrics under my breath like a mantra. the song is perfect, the time --- not so much. halfway through the bridge, my backpack nudges the floor, the strap tangling in my foot.  I hit pause. too early. a sigh. rewind. again.  again.   again. chorus swells I swing the door open. bus horn blares, and the beat drops. maybe I’ll never leave on time. but th

I’m in my room at 11:37 p.m., tracing my desk’s grooves with my fingertips.  Cold wood. Silver moonlight.  My eye twitches. I feel my stomach growl. The clock ticks— tick. tick . tick. … Why am I doing this? To make sense of it all?  Maybe. To fix what’s broken?  Maybe. To understand?  Maybe. Or maybe I’ll never know. Does anyone ever know?  What’s the goal—get to college?  Start a career?  Or aimlessly wander through the world,  a spirit slowly dissipating into shadows? I th

I don’t know how extroverts do it— stack their friends neatly like chairs you can just borrow from another room. Mine don’t overlap  unless it’s a birthday or another special occasion or if I force them to sit at the same lunch table. There’s a version of me that would help you through your math homework, even though I’m just as stuck & then one who would drive to your house in the middle of the night if you needed me to, & then one who would gladly grab dinner— & the worst p

The colors bleed out slowly,  red & purple running down my body  like the eyeshadow i’ve never worn.  They leave behind faded brown among the black,  random streaks that look bare compared to the once-colorful masterpiece that was my hair.  The version of myself i dyed into existence  washes out with the rest of my identity, swirling down the drain,  joining the souls of every child who lost pieces of themselves.

In band, there are rules that only exist after you break them.  Not everyone enforces them.  Just a certain kind of kid—  the kind who speaks for the room  before the room decides.  At the beginning of the year,  I said out loud that trumpet felt hard.  That was it.  Not a complaint. Not an excuse.  Just the truth of missing notes and feeling everyone hear it.  I wondered if clarinet might fit better.  I said it quietly,  to people I trusted.  Insecurity was something I wante

We hung our friendship Like a painting,  Trusted not to fall. We spent years hammering the nails in, slowly affixing every piece, every sharp edge—  Doing routine maintenance. The door was slammed for reasons I still rehearse. The painting slipped, not dramatically, but enough to splinter the frame. A few fragments broke loose. Sometimes we hung it back up But even then we could never get the picture to hold exactly right; We pretended the wall didn’t remember the weight. One