Guilty as charged.
I came here to burn down what was left.
I came here to make you see everything.
This is everything you’ve destroyed.
This is the pain, the coldness, the fear
The emptiness, the rage, the sadness,
The restlessness, the recklessness,
The darkness you’ve created.
This is the never ending night
That you cast with your shadow.
Upon me and them and us all.
Everything’s on fire and I can’t lay down to rest.
I must stand empty.

I must stand empty.

It just gets harder.

Static.

I’m just a pillar of salt in this commotion.
Forget me. I’m just a casualty. I’m no one.
I’m lost in the static. I don’t translate.
I’m screaming from inside your TV set,
But the sound never even leaves.
I’m trapped in my own lungs. Drowning.
Drowning in the oxygen I’ve created.
Drowning in the blood I’ve invented.
I’m everything. I create myself.
It doesn’t matter if the sun sets
Over the sky that I had, once;
I scared it away. I scare everyone away.
Forget me. I’m white noise. Nonsense.
I’m an inkblot and you see me all wrong.
You don’t even hear me at all.
My heartbeat’s too low. World’s too loud,
But I am every voice, every street.
I’m everything and no one can see me.
I’m disappearing.
You’re all killing me.

The clouds are heavy. The sky is loud. This heat is astounding. It hits you like a brick; it hits you like a man without nothing left to lose. Waking is hard, walking is harder. Lining up the words and swallowing the sounds and painting smiles over my lashes so no one really sees where the dust is. Nothing really heals; perhaps that’s the hardest.

It’s odd now. We’re worlds apart, without a single word. I could scream and you wouldn’t listen. You’d push the sound aside. I tossed out your name out. Turns out forever has an expiration date like I always thought. It’s funny how we fooled ourselves, eh? Turns out it wasn’t enough. Love isn’t enough. What feels like a blood oath may very well be thin as water. Maybe we aren’t whole after all. Maybe we just wanted to be whole and couldn’t understand the problem belonged right here. Not in the sea, not in distance, not everyone else’s apathy, but within us. And every time I think of you, I can’t tell if I’m finally starting to see you or if I’m losing sight. Not so strong, not so tall. You sound like a fading picture, but your colors are louder, your angles are sharp. I can see everything I avoided then, and maybe that hurts, more than anything else — to be wrong. Because I lied; it turns out you could shatter the love I had for you.

Losing grip, but who wants to lose touch? I don’t want to let go of your hand, lest you walk away in my sleep.

I woke up impatient, drumming a beat on a steering wheel I don’t yet own, with blood red nails I no longer want. I woke up lost — dazed and confused but without smoke — and I kept walking until I reached a dead end. It didn’t take long to realize I shouldn’t have left. I went to bed exhausted and woke up just the same; a sleepless succession of dreams. I didn’t have time to catch my breath. Dragged myself out of bed. Tea’s gone cold since. Maybe I should stop thinking so much, but I’m scared I’ll disappear. I think, therefore I am, and since I don’t do much, it’s really all I have. I woke up impatient, nervous, mad, exhausted, confused, lost, amazed. Sometimes, I wonder if I’ve been set alight, but I remember I’m still alive. Well then.

To My Dearest Lost Souls,

    Let me tell you something.

    We are heroes. Giants. Warriors. Our fire may not burn like a thousand suns, but it creates warmth in the darkest night. We don’t always feel brave, but we’ll fight to the death the right to claim it, because it’s what we are above all. Brave.
    Brave in spite of our wayward hope, the one that comes and goes to its own will. Brave in spite of our own darkness, the one that casts a shadow like no other. Brave in spite of voices that insist on degrading us, on destroying us.
    We are kindness, because we know that all words ease their way into your soul regardless of their goodness or intent. We are patience, because life has turned us into stone. We are passion, because the sparks it brings will free us all. We are strength, because no one will help us carry our burdens. We aren’t weak. We aren’t helpless. We aren’t the waste of time they insist on implying we are.
    If today, they snark “You have done nothing” and they mean “You are nothing”, they are wrong. We have risen from beds we had no reason to rise from, we have thought things no one dares to think of. We have taken dives into worlds we are the sole inhabitants of and we have emerged back to reality, tired but victorious. We have cried the tears that weighted us down and sung, drawn, written, played, screamed the pain that anchored us to the past. We found our last breath and held it a little bit longer. We have stayed alive, for what seems like no reason at all. Today, we stood in the face of adversity and said, “This isn’t much, but it’s all I got; you’re not taking it away from me”.
    Us; the wayward sons and daughters, the odd-ones-out, the outcast, the misunderstood, the home-stranded boys and girls, the hopeless bunch, the makers of dreams, the dreams of things, the believers in all things impossible, the ones who will never truly give up, the ones who will never truly give in, the ones who aren’t lost but wandering, the coming-of-age and the soon-to-be.
    We are kings and queens. We are the incoming storm. Giants and heroes and warriors and rulers and inventors. We are the stuff of legend.