[▶] for safekeeping.

this, is my chronicle.

Inspiration: maybe this is ironic in that this isn't really my chronicle, but perhaps it also is, because these words had to come from somewhere, didn't they?

presented this at garden voices, 2018 (in school) - and shared my writing with people in person for the first time.
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○ poem •

blind.

a ghost of a man, dancing on the train

tip of polished shoe rising, kissing the air briefly before touching another imaginary point of a constellation

he has drawn on the floor.

but I look away as I write this,

and by the time I look back,

he has disappeared.

was this dream really reality?

this strange, yet not unwelcoming feeling

being let privy to the secrets laying in minds

even millenias after

the moments themselves have gone.

a multitude of dimensions, interlacing threads of time woven through bracketed impulses

lost, misty specks of past hopes and aspirations

percolating slowly through the crying, blooming dusk.

harsh, accusing whispers

a dismal crack in an alabaster bone, spilling burgundy from the ashened crevice -

marble tiles dusting with the echoes of a sigh, regret that

perhaps the delusion of the sickness had gotten to her.

when your eyes are squeezing tears

and they form fast, burning your eyes with the anguish and irony that

you hadn't meant to cry at all

do you smile, brush it off -

or hide away, locking yourself in once and for all?

maybe you've noticed the lack of an option to say

"hey, no, I'm not fine at all,

in fact I don't know if I've really felt okay for maybe

a few months? longer than that?"

because so often, you see how happy the world is

how beautiful it is that people are in their element

they deserve to be happy, you know that

so you shield them

from the ink that blots your canvas, in hopes that

- it will never blot theirs.

--

afire light

meaning, hope, aspirations -

running, running, running.

chasing the fast-slipping, escaping wisps of youth with crippling fingers -

blink. blink again.

you're there, facing a crowd of hundreds, an array of patterns, bold hues, simple flat mediums.

loved ones, acquaintances, strangers, perhaps people who will never step foot into this same room again.

maybe you've never seen them before. maybe you never will. maybe you always do.

but they have come to witness a singular moment in your life,

this one moment.

an instance where you're so lost in the impossibility of the magic that time becomes a concept

a foreign object, something of insubstantiality -

and before you know it, it's all over.

blink, blink.

it's Sunday morning, you've woken to the scent of fresh coffee

washing its way through your apartment.

you walk to the kitchen, turn round the corner and breathe a smile onto your lips, sunshine etching love in your eyes.

you get ready to say good morning, kiss your darling, say hi -

but you sit up.

you sit up, and it's cold. the room feels dank, there's an air of neglect hanging around the furniture.

the solitude clings to your skin, your clothes from the previous day still slumped over the chair, office documents on the table.

you silence the dull ringing by slamming your palm on the rounded bell by your bed,

it's time for another day of work.

you wrinkle the cotton bedspreads between your fingers, breath leaving your body like lead.

you can't remember the last time you were able to smile.

blink, blink.

you're en route to somewhere -

work, home, a movie. who knows?

you're talking to someone. a few others. you exchange secret laughter, jokes that would probably make of nothing

if they were with someone else.

you can't remember how you met them or why. what motivated you to say, "hey, I like these people. I want to spend time

making new dreams. new futures. new possibilities.

with whoever they are."

and your heart blossoms with peals of new life

springing from your lips, echoing in the air -

mixing with the harmony of those others. rejuvenating. rejoicing.

so, you see -

it does get better.

so much better.

- fin -