the poet

ares is nauseous. he wanders through the remains of a middle eastern elementary school and a city street brought to rubble by terrorists and feels sick. he’s stopped glorifying war a long time ago, this is not what fighting for your country should be like. no part of it is heroic or valiant or courageous. just senseless killing, so much senseless killing. he cradles a disfigured child in his arms and screams for it to stop. zeus is bored. justice isn’t existent anymore. his charisma is fading, his cat-calls are growing increasingly more brash. he’s desperate for something he can’t put a finger on. he’s useless, disregarded, alone. and he’s beginning to realize that he’s in the wrong. hera is angry. commitment has vanished, now she walks tall with her hands clenched in fists, confident in her own strength, ready to teach women about their own power. poseidon is sick of having to rinse out pollution and chemicals from his water. his charm is being replaced more and more by h...

I watched the stars until my eyes burned. desperate to keep them open but finally succumbing to the ache and allowing them to close, only to snap them awake a second after. i watched them, like dust all aglow, like splashes of watery paint flicked onto white paper, as they hovered above me. they were teaching me how to exist in midair.

our puzzle came second-hand, missing a crucial part of its plan, lost somewhere in another’s living. i won’t be able to complete the image.

i am italicized -  relating to thought or foreign words. hardly strong enough to stand up straight, instead slanted over balancing my weight on one side from all the times i’ve been pushed away.

i, i was taught to lie i was taught to lie through my teeth and i, i was taught to hide i was taught to hide through my tears and i, i was taught to mask i was taught to mask through my fears and i, i was taught to smile i was taught to smile through my screams

it was probably nothing but it felt like the world

her battleground was dangerous—a void of despair—but it was part of her nature to wear her sadness so well. she was the only light in her dark world, trying and failing to spread it further. they say that the stars that are the biggest burn loudly and die quietly, quickly. she was that star, freezing herself to throw light as far as she could reach.

She’s sitting in the passenger seat, backpack held close to her chest to protect her from the road ahead. She’s leaving herself behind, and she’s scared of what lies in front of her. She’s sitting in the passenger seat, watching again as the road changes in front of her, helpless to pull the wheel or push the brake. She’s sitting in the passenger seat, her new guardian beside her. Only fifteen years old and already she’s seen the walls of six different buildings to call home. She’s sitting in the passenger seat, pulling out of the driveway of her last prison. Her backpack is balanced on her knees again, she’s keeping it close; the one thing that has never left. She’s sitting in the driver’s seat, feeling the wheel turn under her hands as she pulls out of the agency’s parking lot. Her backpack is sitting across from her, its familiar battered face a comfort. The road ahead of her no longer holds any fear, for she’s the one in the driver’s seat now; she can go where she w...