The soil rots quietly

beneath our battered feet.

In my hands,

a fractured image -

of you,

of me.

There’s something almost _sonder_

about our freedom:

how it slithers up our necks,

slides down our throats,

pleading

to be seen,

to be praised.

Something is missing,

and I dread to know what.

I will walk to death

before I speak

His name

again....

they ask me,

why do they look at

us like that? and I can’t

quite explain. at least not

in a way that makes sense,

because they don’t

know yet why other

people struggle to process the

grandness of the universe,

yet the narrowness of

the human mind. because

where there are flowers

we see death, and where

there is death we see God.

I have never ended a sentence—

all I know are commas, and

continuati...

Diamonds are beautiful,

but they are also strong.

That girl in your comp-sci class,

rainbow glasses,

nails like constellations,

does not need your soft-eyed pity.

Her mother mapped the stars,

and her grandmother

bit into forbidden fruit.

There is nothing she cannot do.

I once knew a woman

who sliced the sun open

like a ripe mango,

let fire spill down her arms

just to prove she could

to someone ...

I am not a killer. But

every night, I beg Jesus

to heal my killing hands.

There is blood everywhere.

I cannot escape the labels

given to me at birth. I know

I have the ability to be more.

I know how far apart

each star is from the next,

and that, with the right calculations,

I can see hope.

I am not a killer. But

every night, I beg Jesus

to heal my killing hands...

She asks,

_How much will be left_

_of me when you’re done?_

He kicks off his shoes,

shrugs off his coat,

steps forward twice,

and says it won’t matter—

_She’ll be fixed._

__

**DEDICATED TO:**

the girl who thought those

men could save her,

because she tried everyone else.

who learned too soon

that her hands and mouth

were meant for something rotten.

who carries, even in her marrow,

their filth,

t...

Even the softest things can be killed.

The innocent wolf does not forget

his teeth—his mother’s,

his father’s—

how they sliced open the deer

he saw in dreams.

How blood stains enamel.

No one will ever understand

his impurity.

He is tainted in ways

even his own mind

cannot make sense of.

And he doesn’t know

why it hurts

so much....

My mother tells me I should be ashamed

of my love. It is too pure, too reasonable,

too full of truth. She tells me,

the human brain is about three to five times

heavier than the human heart,

and yet I let it outweigh

every part of me that knows

better.

And she’s right.

I should be ashamed of

a lot of things,

and I am.

But loving cannot

be one of them.

Because no matter how much it

kills me, it ...

so I was born into hands

that didn’t know they were claws.

and loving was a vice

because, without a doubt,

you’d be unloved in the end.

so—my sister grew teeth

faster than she grew a heart.

my heart grew inside out,

and my teeth never learned

how to come in.

so—my mother rubbed my gums

with alcohol and leaves,

then left me alone

in hopes I’d learn

to make loneliness mine.

when I hear growling,

...

when my father dies,

I am like chalk on sidewalk.

I have prepared myself for this

moment for years.

when planning the funeral,

I am like summer on

a sunday night.

I tell the mortician exactly

which casket he deserves,

and say the suit doesn’t matter.

when giving my speech,

I am like ice in water.

I don’t lie; I tell everyone

what a horrible person he was.

when my father dies, I am

fear living i...

Picture this:

A faceless man

on the corner of a street you’ve never

been down before.

Shackles bite his wrists,

his ankles,

chains that spool out endlessly,

like veins of iron.

In each link,

a name is faintly inscribed,

ghost-script in the metal.

You know,

in that strange, buried way,

you know what the

names mean. And you know,

with the quiet dread of recognition,

who the faceless man is,

and...