Counting the Days Until Freedom
When we look at our lives, what do we see?
Not the labels they press into our skin,
not the shape we’re forced to wear
so others can sleep easier
believing we belong.
When I look at mine,
I don’t see much—
hardly anything at all.
Purpose feels like smoke:
it gives direction,
but slips through your fingers
when you try to hold it.
How do we find one that’s real?
Not unreachable,
not too simple,
just hard enough to make life
feel worth playing.
Because even a game with no challenge
dies before the second level.
For me,
it’s a void.
Darkness, or maybe potential—
I haven’t figured out which.
But honestly,
I don’t think I’ll live long enough to know.
Not long enough to watch the sun rise
without the weight of the day
pressing on my chest.
Not long enough to watch it set
without yawning through exhaustion.
Not long enough to feel happiness
as something steady—
not fleeting,
not borrowed,
but something that stays.
My eyes are heavy,
and I think the heaviness has moved in.
It’s not a symptom anymore,
it’s a soulmate.
It clings like a mother
protecting her child.
And I stand at the shore,
alone.
Looking into the darkness
like an old friend,
wondering if stepping forward
will spark something—
anything.
But feeling
has become a foreign language.
So I march on,
because they told me to.
Told me I’m strong.
Told me to keep going.
Told me I’m a soldier.
But I’m not.
I didn’t survive war—
I live in it.
The grenades still fall.
The shrapnel still buries itself
in the characters of my mind,
the ones I made
to feel less alone.
They say your inner child never dies.
But maybe mine did.
Maybe humans live twice—
once as a child,
once as an adult—
and I’ve already burned through both.
And maybe that’s okay.
Maybe I don’t care anymore.
I am terrified of death, yes—
of leaving,
of watching from the stars
the life I couldn’t finish.
But part of me wants to see
how the story ends.
I’ve never liked opaque endings,
so why should mine
be left unread?
Still, staring into the void,
there’s nothing.
No emotion
to tell me which way to go.
So I’ll sit here.
In the quiet.
In the nothing.
Counting the days until freedom—
whatever that means—
because that’s what I’m worth,
and maybe,
that’s all I’ve ever been.