Writing

Every July 4th, I wonder why we do this. Why we stand on the sides of the streets, watching little children hold their arms out for candy, gazing at the police cars and fire trucks rolling by in tandem.

This is the worst kind of anticipation

this anticipation isn't just fear of what is to come

it's laced around the edges with knowledge of how it went last time

of how a repeat of last year is most likely inevitable.

I am 15, a rising sophomore struggling mentally. Can’t motivate myself to do much, still dreading the first day of school. I often find the phrase “I can’t” pouring out of my mouth as I feel out of control, laying in my mom’s arms.

I think she should’ve known this would happen

When that straight-A girl became the one 

who’d sneak out past midnight,

And the cries turned to hindsight.
 

somewhere a lantern burns in the woods.

somewhere a cold blind man suffers.

they will never meet.

Fear is such a funny thing, which looks at you with no humor in its gaze
  and never blinks wide eyes, and is thin and crippled and seething, and has tears glinting off its cheeks, and is
    small and alone