Poems

Trust Shadows Behind every smile, a secret lurks,in every handshake, the shadow works.I read between lines that they never say,watching for signs they’ll betray me today.Sleep with one eye open, on the edge of night,each whispered word a blade, poised to strike. Trust no one, their motives always hidden,in smiles that lie, and eyes that […]

They Found a Tooth in the Vent It started with a rattle behind the grate,a clicking rhythm that didn’t quite wait.Maintenance said it was just old dust,but we all smelled rust, sweat, and trust. Then the nurse pulled back the metal plate,and something fell with a sound like fate.Not a screw. Not a bolt. Not

Ticking Mirrors In the glass, I trace lines that deepen,counting wrinkles, fears that steepen.Gray hairs fall like leaves in rot,my youth decays, but I forgot. Ticking behind my eyes, a clock so cruel,every second whispers, “fool.”I fight the sag, the soften, the fade,in the mirror’s light, I’m afraid. Joints ache with every move I make,each

The Word Unwritten In the quiet of my room, the ink flows like a curse,scripting shadows on the walls, in the universe reversed.Each letter carved upon the air, a sigil of my fate,trapped within a looping scrawl that I grow to hate. They move with minds all their own,these traitors at the end of my

The list on my phonethe list goes back to somewhere i cannot locate in the calendar anymore—it holds the plumber from the pipe thing and the doctor and a floor-to-ceiling inventory of everything i’ve promised to attend tosince the last time i was the organized kind—the end toall that started around the time i started

They Changed My Room While I Slept I woke up to silence, but it wasn’t the same kind as before,the air felt too clean, and the light bent away from the floor.My blanket had edges it never had before last night,and the ceiling stared back like it had something to write. My pillow was softer,

The Wedding Speech I Gave in My HeadI gave a wedding speech once — her best friend’s —prepared for two weeks, cut it down to three minutes,delivered the edited portrait at the receptionwhile the whole real speech stayed in my head.The whole real speech was about her, not the couple —or about her as evidence

The Weekend I Didn’t Leave the HouseThe first night I convinced myself the door was a deferred decision—I’d go out when the precision of wanting something external came back online,when the gap between the interior and the blueprintof a normal weekend closed itself from the inside out.The gap did not close. I fell asleep withoutSaturday

The Walls Changed Color When She Left She didn’t scream when they wheeled her out,didn’t look back, didn’t whisper doubt.But the air shifted sideways as the door clicked closed,and the color drained from the walls like it knew what it chose. Her room had been warm, like old decay,with handprints smudged in childish gray.But the

The Unanswered TextTwo gray marks. That cruel underline—proof I existed in your periphery,that you chose the nothing.My words hung there,confirmation of my own dismissal. The screen stayed dark.Silence is a blade that cuts without lifting a hand,the kind of wound that doesn’t bleedbut throbs deep under the ribswhere pride pretends to live. I replayed what