empty

the earth tells me i am too small
and i grin back all bloody corners and chapped lips.
i have never looke innocent a day in my life, i know, i know.
my smile has always been too hungry to satisfy.
i am continuing the long tradition of men
i am wanting more than i can have
i am biting off more than i can chew
i am running faster than my legs allow me to.

the earth tells me i am too small
and i know it's true, i have known since childhood that i am nothing,
i am a single lamp in the cacophony of light that is a city.
the universe is cold like a biting winter's day,
you can feel it, i swear, from all the way inside,
i can feel it just sitting on my bed sometimes
the chill of the universe has seeped its way inside of me,
the dust settling into my lungs like
something we call allergies.

the earth tells me i am too small
and i scream, scream until it feels like my lungs will give out.
the first time i screamed was in the woods
there is something about the nothing between the trees.
it makes you realise that there is emptiness.
i reach inside of myself and pull out as many things as possible,
trawling through my intestines.
i want so badly for things to be full.
do you think the sky is just an echo of what's inside of me?
i could use the space between the trees as a mirror,
i could be narcissius,
i could be an empty thing that's bigger than i'm supposed to be.

the earth tells me i am too small.
it's true.
i scream at the sky
and no one hears me.
one day i will die
and they may not remember me.
the universe is cold
but i am a candle flame,
quickly snuffed, yes,
but important.

the earth tells me i am too small.
and i have never felt so free.




 

Nightheart

VT

18 years old

More by Nightheart

  • My People (As Anchors)

    Brown bodies sink, 
    are weighted, stick 
    to the ocean floor, falling
    from overcrowded rafts
    into the arms of their heathen’s heaven.

    Brown bodies are shot over 
    the border like cannon balls.
  • Bluebird song

    Climate Change Contest: Gold

    I. 
    I wish I hadn’t been born in the Age of Extinction, 
    I really don’t think my origami heart was made for this,
  • An American prayer

    This is an American prayer. 
    This is a mother lifting her child onto her fingertips. 
    This is our planes leaving. 
    This is a blurry green shot of a soldier. 
    This is a history book.