writer

i. when you learn to write, you revoke your ability to hold back, to stay silent, to fade into the background. when you learn to write, you learn to open your eyes and it is impossible to close them again. they are open wide and you are not allowed to be blind again. words tremble in your throat, a fountain of incandescent feelings igniting on your gasoline lips. 

ii. you dream of the ocean opening its maw wide to swallow you whole and of your arms turning to iridescent wings as you dive beneath the waves. you dream of scales the color of emerald moss soaked in your dark-dreams replacing your skin and of opening your mouth and swallowing your poison-tail whole. you dream of stars and constellations written into the folds of your skin and of your god burning his mark into your shoulder blades. it tastes like tobacco and marijuana and all the hopes you left behind. you dream of pompeii turning history to dust and land to ashes and when you cross the river you lose your heavy spine in the mud. god smiles at you and gifts you a daisy stem to replace it. it is softer now, but no less strong. 

iii. your hands shake as ink spills from your mind to the page in the form of delicate power-hungry words. no one seems to understand that if you don't let them out they will rot inside you and turn alive and eat you from the inside out and the outside in. the people do not understand, they never have and i suspect they never will. you cannot let the words stay where they do not belong and they have never belonged inside your mind. it is a sacred place, you plead. no one listens to you. 

iv. you have watched centuries pass in the blink of an eye from within this castle of gilded walls built within your mind. how many times have you rebuilt this very place? how many times have you had to start again from the ashes and broken bricks? too many times have the words ravaged inside you. 

v. you are never safe.