The Weight of My Own Hands

 I breathe in ash and starlight,

my lungs stitched shut with threads of longing.

Every pulse inside me whispers: create, create,

as though eternity itself would vanish

if I set down my brush, my pen, my song.

The joy is a fever—

it burns through the marrow,

each idea a flame licking the walls of my ribs.

I am radiant in the fire,

but oh, how it consumes me.

When stillness comes,

when silence settles on the table,

I drown in its gravity—

a crushing tide pressing on my chest,

reminding me that without the act of making,

I am only clay,

mortal, unfinished.

And yet, I reach again for the weight,

choose suffocation over emptiness.

Because even as it strangles,

creation sings me awake—

and in the pain of it,

I feel most alive.

The Forge of My Scars

Once, I cursed the ache

that lived beneath my ribs,

a restless ember smoldering,

burning without flame.

I thought it only hollowed me—

a thief in the night

that stripped my voice,

left me trembling in silence.

But pain is a teacher,

brutal and uninvited.

It sharpens the senses,

pulls the veil from the eyes,

makes every shadow visible,

every whisper louder.

It carved caverns in me,

rooms I never wanted,

yet in those hollowed chambers

echoes began to sing.

Songs I could not have written

without the ache of remembering.

Through suffering I learned

the tender map of empathy,

the small tremor in a voice,

the glimmer of fear

in someone else’s eyes.

Because I had been there—

I could see what others hid.

And now,

when I create,

I know the colors more deeply:

crimson of longing,

violet of sorrow,

gold of survival.

The wounds did not ruin me—

they refined me.

The pain I carried

became the proof I lived,

and in its wake

I became sharper,

softer,

truer—

a vessel for beauty

that could only be born

from brokenness.

The Alchemy of Seasons

A seed sleeps,

curled like a secret

beneath the patient soil.

Rain kneels down,

pressing soft hands into earth,

whispering, wake, grow, become.

The stem rises,

a fragile green prayer

breaking through stone.

Storms come,

bending it near to breaking,

yet the wind teaches strength

better than stillness ever could.

Petals unfold—

not all at once,

but in slow, trembling breaths,

as though the flower must learn

to trust its own color.

And when autumn arrives,

it does not mourn.

It scatters its gold freely,

a final act of generosity

before returning to silence.

So it is with us—

we weather, we bloom,

we let go.

Transformation is not a moment,

but the endless turning

of being into becoming.

Frog in My Throat, Paint on My Hands

 There’s a frog in my throat,

a stone lodged in silence—

it croaks at the edges of words

I cannot speak.

The weight of it presses

like wet wool on my chest,

a gray hush that smothers

every spark before it can ignite.

Yet my fingers itch for colors,

my veins buzz with lines unsaid.

Canvas calls me like an open wound,

paper like a confessional—

and even as the fog presses down,

I bleed shapes and shadows,

whispers and screams,

from the cracks depression leaves behind.

Art becomes the mouth I cannot open,

the lungs that exhale when I am breathless.

The heaviness may drown my tongue,

but it cannot drown the ink.

Every brushstroke, every syllable

is both an anchor and a wing—

reminding me I am tethered,

reminding me I can still rise.

The frog may sit stubborn in my throat,

but my hands, my heart, my vision

sing louder than it ever could.

Through the ache,

I create.

Through the silence,

I roar.

It’s time to let me go

 

I don’t want to be a space holder,

a shadow in the corner of your story.

I am a queen,

a goddess draped in firelight,

and I deserve to be seen as such.

You have done nothing wrong.

The years we’ve shared—

five long seasons of nature and travel,

of rivers and roads,

of skies unfolding above us—

I hold them tenderly,

pressed between the pages of my heart.

I hope you carry my love

like I carry yours.

But it’s time to let me go.

I cannot be a sugar mama,

a placeholder,

a comfort when no one else is near.

I am seeking something lasting,

a lifetime woven in passion and compassion,

a love that wants me

as much as I want it.

I don’t have as much time as you—

a few good years left,

and I will not spend them

in the waiting room of someone else’s life.

It hurts my heart,

tears out my gut,

just to say these words:

But it’s time to let me go.

Being poly has been a gift,

and yet a wound—

for my desire burns too bright for you,

too much for your comfort.

You push me away daily,

while she is cradled

in your arms through the night.

You hold her close,

while I am sent from the room

to sleep alone.

You love her with fire,

numerous times each day.

With me, a flicker once a week—

and even then,

it feels like duty,

not desire.

Still, I do not deny your love.

I know it is there,

quiet, enduring,

a corner of your heart

with my name carved in it.

But passion is absent,

and without it,

I wither.

I love you,

and I always will.

But what I seek is precise,

and it will take me time to find.

I need the space to search,

to claim the devotion

that matches the fire within me.

So let me go,

with gratitude for what we’ve shared,

with respect for what we’ve built,

with sorrow for what we could not hold.

Let me go,

because I am a queen,

a goddess,

and I cannot stay

in the silence of being unseen.