pencils down

times up.

[failsaves]

it's the place you'll never see, the thing you'll never feel, up on the hills where the rainfall smears, glowered like a canvas wet and wearied. not fear, you feel that all the time; or terror, the kind that follows you out into the nightfields... but not being loved, being unloved, being unlovable. that feeling. lucky you.

[failsaves]

Come closer, begged the sun to the moon, but they had always been worlds apart.

[failsaves]

too many stars cloud your head too many hearts fluster your own and those lips all the words that they speak make you dizzy.

[failsaves]

They fed you poison so that’s what you became.

[failsaves]

we aren’t meant for each other. we prick away at the things that make us tick, puppet-mastering for our reckless designs, pretending the gleam in our eyes is childish amusement. we say to each other, “don’t cry, crying is for the weak,” and then cry to ourselves anyway. we’re here now, grown up, all done baking, hitting and hitting with hammers, water, words, still sucking on our mother’s love until the milk runs dry, calling it love.

and it is love, love in its most primal form: obsession. fear. emptiness.