break
1. I remember when I was 6 years old
and flies would swarm underneath my bed
holding their tails in their eyes
pressing their venom between their crumbled hearts.
just when I forgot how to be alive,
their buzzing would pull me beneath a deep dark sleep.
that was when things started going wrong.
one by one they would emerge and look into my eyes.
I would untangle myself from the grips of the night
and try to catch them with my hollowed fingers
but they slipped right through me like water
and even though I could never catch them,
I never gave up.
2. When I was ten, I woke up to an unfamiliar buzzing.
my skin had become coarse and bruised
with all my sunken dreams
that I stored underneath my aching pores.
I saw a fly stand over my bed, holding one of my tears
and laugh.
How could he have stolen parts of my visions
without me noticing.
It was then that I realized I was breaking,
but I chased that fly around my room
until I proudly wore its glazed defeated armor
on my palm.
3. When I was 13, I couldn’t sleep.
I stayed up and watched the ceiling shudder
as the windows’ forgetful moon
forgot once more how to light up my dreams.
I heard a fly buzzing once more, but this time
this time I couldn’t find it.
It was then that I realized I was broken.
