Nada

A machine, a girl
curled around nothing
a hand, reaching into
her cogs, her inner workings

holding tight, stopping the life
from flickering
to full blast

gears try to crunch through
that long dead hand
but are stopped everytime

she jerks
she tries to become something
that dead hand
stops her everytime

she was almost there, almost awake
ready to reach out
rip the chain slowing her down
she was almost there, almost alive

hay nada podemos hacer
a cambiar este

she deserved better

oil leaking onto the ground, 
she begins to shut down
as she does
the hand lets go

and she bursts out in a blaze
of glory and fire and screams
she's awake, she's alive

everything will get better. no matter who or what your dead hand is, it will always get better.

Abriatis

NY

YWP Alumni

More by Abriatis

  • i am me.

    it's 12am on nine-eleven-twenty-twenty.
    my name is rowan, and i am eighteen.
    i have struggled. i have cried. i did not think i'd make it this far.
    i did not think i'd do half the things i have.
  • nine-eleven

    to think that i will be a legal adult tomorrow.
    i could vote. i could buy fish at petsmart.
    i could apply to places like aldi's and tractor supply.

    my birthday, for me, has always been tinged with sadness.
  • placidity

    i watch the numbers tick up.
    i read the headlines.
    suny oneonta shuts down for the semester -
    six hundred cases.

    i go outside.
    i see the masks, worn properly or not.
    the spraying of hand sanitizer,