Once a month I have a dream
Around the time my period would start.
It often has a horrendous theme 
That pinches and tears my wounded heart.

It often starts with an innocent mind,
Where I’m happy and living free,
Then the fear I’ve come to find,
The beating soul that lives in me.

“How did this happen?” I think to myself.
“Not once has my innocence been taken.”
But now I am stuck, my options on the shelf,
Thinking: “Surely I must be mistaken.” 

The pain in my gut is dread and fear,
With the child within sucking my life away.
But I don’t want these feelings to stop the gears
Of the life within that wants to stay. 

Three options are laid out for me to see:
Abortion, adoption, or raising the kid. 
No matter what, we both can’t flee
From the fate ahead I wish to rid.

I am now conscious, my stomach now flat,
But as I write, I can’t help but think …

it was easier
when we were kids
dealing with scabbed knees
instead of scarred wrists
eating paste instead of 
inhaling it 
writing with pens instead of 
pretending to be normal and 
vaping with fake ones

it was easier 
when we were kids
we didn't care about politics
or global warming
or gun violence
or the future;
we thought our lives would
forever be solidified in 
sticky summer sweat and
graham cracker crumbs
drenched in apple juice
stuck to sand-covered fingers
from the hours we spent in the sandbox
forming worlds in which we could pretend-
who would've thought 
we'd want to escape reality 
so much more 
years later?

it was easier
when we were kids
not a care in the world because
the world didn't care for us
we didn't obsess over numbers on our Instagram posts
we didn't obsess over texts from people we hated