a place to write your heart out. anonymous submissions for when you feel it. it doesn’t have to make sense. this is an invitation.
insecurities. inspirations. great hopes and even greater fears. memories and nightmares. moments that changed everything. friends that helped you dream of who you could be.
moments we let slip away.
this is a place to write about it.
inspired by my friend kyla at pure nowhere :)
July 2026
JUNE 2026
•
JUNE 2026 •
you succeeded in killing a part of me
messy footsteps
confused when you’re high
all the time
tripping over
misplaced bitterness and
i can see you’re upset.
i know it’s easier
to blame me
but i wish you wouldn’t
twist reality
till my skin turns white
like a ghost
pacing in the attic.
apparitions get scared too,
circling the living.
haunting people
who think themselves
incapable of killing
something beautiful.
insecurities disfigure
hands that used to love me
twisted into claws.
manipulation tastes like poison.
ghosts ponder how to forgive
their killers
for their mistakes
but there’s no room
to grow between the weight of
what’s already dead.
sometimes there is no future.
no real good feeling
in running away from
parts of ourselves
we don’t want to see anymore.
won’t let me breathe.
won’t let me love you.
holding on tight
just to let the wound fester.
you don’t want to lose your grip.
make sure
to drown me
until i can’t tell the difference
between texts and
panic attacks.
feels like
pouring alcohol inside of raw skin.
purging
and burning.
cleaning up is always messy
when you’re ambushed.
when your guard is down.
when you thought you would never let
something like this happen to you.
it feels like magic
to give yourself
to someone.
to touch their soul.
to see the breaking apart of reality
to be pushed away
slowly
clawed at with open arms
killing a part of me
that loves you
until you are
drowning
in your own poison
pleading with me
suffocating me
until i reconsider.
NOVEMBER 2025
•
NOVEMBER 2025 •
songwriting
feels like opening a portal. try to take too much control of where you’re going and you’ll miss the best part. fariha talks a lot about decolonization in their workshops and in writing i think that looks like learning to detach yourself from forcing things a certain way. it feels better to let go of any certainty. to reorient around the feeling. learning to spend more time with your body. to listen to what’s already there. to listen closer. it’s not about ego or anything really to do with what you think you want at the start. the best part is learning over and over to open yourself back up again and seeing what you find behind the curtain.
APRIL 2025
•
APRIL 2025 •
What do you see?
how many times
can i sink to the bottom of the ocean
burying old memories
my eyes are too swollen to see.
looking for pieces of myself
lost in the dirt.
my memory’s not what it used to be
and my heart
won’t stop
like i hoped it would.
my body is revolting.
forcing me to look at
the lines in my cheeks
that have deepened
from a decade spent
learning to abandon myself.
39 beats per minute
a gesture of loyalty.
sometimes my heart slows down so much
i become afraid.
i realize i don’t know if i still want it to stop
like i used to.
we walk around as if
somehow
we’ll be spared.
as if
somehow
we’ll have enough time. as if
somehow
we’ll be here forever.
but we won’t.
i hope we get to stay
for a while tho.
even on the strangest days.
just a little longer.
i hope we find something beautiful
in the mess that’s been made.
JANUARY 2025
•
JANUARY 2025 •
Where does your pain live? What soothes it? What does it taste like?
i always turn the lock.
heavy handed on the porcelain and
i look different from the stories i tell myself.
brutal honesty is hard to come by.
and the years i’ve spent holding myself underwater
are catching up with me now.
i wanna see what it looks like.
the skin that doesn’t know how to repair itself.
the fatigue under my eyes.
i need to know it was real.
isolation is a poison.
killing the host slowly.
crushing dissent,
disarming,
unspeakable,
incorruptible.
i was naive for giving it a home.
for letting it leech the soul from my body.
for thinking, somehow, after everything,
i wouldn’t be so fucking alone.
i’ve been looking in the mirror lately,
where my fears become tangible.
when we are face to face.
i only look for long enough
when i’m high.
when my defenses crumble.
it’s hard to throw your life away
without guilt,
or swollen cheeks.
but the walls are beginning to
break down,
from neglect,
and carelessness.
from survival.
i think often of
the ways in which i’m not good enough.
the words with which I set myself on fire.
the poison that is killing me.
the poison that is the cure.
DECEMBER 2024
•
DECEMBER 2024 •
What part of yourself did you lose this year? What did you find?
it feels good to say, “i’m here for you”
but it’s rare to open yourself back up again
without being attacked,
though we dream of being held.
sometimes i visit my mom at her apartment,
though not as often as i should.
she teaches me how to cook
while i ask her existential questions.
she tells me laughter is the key to happiness
and i ask her more questions.
i haven’t laughed in a long time.
laughed like i’m crying.
like life feels like a miracle.
like my best friend kissing me on a swing set at 4:00 am.
like really truly knowing someone.
i haven’t felt like laughing lately.
life became so raw.
and heartbreaking.
i wonder often if she’s right.
i’m in the hospital and my friends like to tell me to
“stay positive” but i’m having trouble.
i tell the receptionists that “it’s ok” when the specialist is booked.
i tell my friends not to worry while my aneurysm is getting worse.
when the medications aren’t helping with the pain.
when my doctors are lost for words.
while my body becomes irreparable.
they tell me to “hang in there”
and i have a good attitude
while i’m having a stroke.
a calm demeanor
when i lose my vision,
when the surgery fails.
losing a part of me that won’t come back.
when my surgeons tell me i’ll be better suited for a desk job.
while i make peace with my life ending so soon.
i let go of things that used to make me happy.
i stay positive when we talk about
amputation.
losing control over my entire body.
i can’t remember the last time i laughed
since the procedure failed.
since they denied my insurance.
collections is fiending to collect.
we receive another bill.
i see martyrs
on my phone.
in flames.
in Gaza,
i see zionists killing hospital patients.
and my blood thinners aren’t enough to stop the clotting in my arm,
but i’m out of network anyways.
and it seems all i’ve been doing is trying to stay positive, but
i’m exhausted.
from having my heart prodded
and stabbed as if it were invincible.
and i know everyone wants me to smile more,
but i can’t remember feeling close to someone
who really knows me.
it gets so fucking lonely
in my room,
in the gurney
in the OR
hallucinating off the oxy
on the bathroom floor,
at a party surrounded by all of my friends.
and i’m sorry that i’m not the same person i used to be.
that i don’t laugh as much anymore.
not like I used to.
i guess you could say i haven’t been feeling like myself lately.
