Hope is a dream,
and dreams turn to night,
nightmares grow teeth
and call this life.
My soul is swallowed by echoing screams,
I’m fighting to wake—
but I’m not asleep.
I walk like a ghost with a heartbeat still warm,
haunting the life I was meant to perform.
Lost in the weight of unanswered grief,
exhausted by breathing,
by being, by me.
It’s never enough.
I’m never enough.
Why didn’t I try?
Why didn’t I fall?
Why does existence feel staged at a crawl?
Why does living feel borrowed, rehearsed, untrue—
a lie I wake up and drag myself through?
I hide in the dark where the starlight won’t reach,
cast into shadow so hope can’t see me.
My spirit is chaos, my vision in blur,
my eyes overflow with all I defer.
Loss bends my spine, pulls gravity close,
my body a question no one will pose:
Is love worth the breaking?
The cost of the fall?
Or is it safer to feel nothing at all?
They say time will heal, but the clock never moves,
its hands frozen stiff while I circle the truth.
I drown out my thoughts just to quiet the sound,
submerged in the silence so I don’t break down.
I haunt every version of who I could be,
spiraling skies still calling for me.
Meant to be seen, but taught to be small,
taught to stay quiet, or not speak at all.
Invisible armor, invincible skin,
no one can tell what I carry within.
I won’t show the cracks,
won’t loosen my hold,
won’t gamble on peace,
won’t risk being whole.
I stay bound by fear dressed up as control,
chained by perception that edits my soul.
Interpretation tells stories untrue
of a girl they think they already knew.
A girl with a mask at every front door,
windows nailed shut, heart barred once more.
A girl who stopped living to savor a frame,
paused in a moment, suspended in pain.
Frozen in time between what was and why,
a shadow still burning against the sky.
Not gone.
Not free.
Still here.
Still flame.
Crow and fire—
remember my name.
Crow and Flame 