standing there, in the ocean of people and music and flashing lights and voices and faces and lust and youth and sweet sixteen ages, i've never felt so lost

their faces turn into demons and curses and ghouls and their eyes flash red like the ghosts screaming in my head, forever dying and breathing beer and dihydrogen monoxide & dying again. they're all laughing and sneering dark shadows against vermillion skies of my twisted reality nightmares. they're all the monsters in my head that i immortalized once i looked at them because they will die inside with me but continue to exist because i refuse to die, for some reason. ever since i saw you.

{they come closer, closer, closer

as

/ THE LIGHTNING /

/ IN MY HEAD/

/ EXPLODES AND THROBS AND DULLS OVER AND OVER AGAIN/

/ I DROWN /

/ IN DIZZYING SENSATIONS /

/ OF /

burning, burning

/ BEER BURNING DOWN MY THROAT /

/ burning, burning }

the numbness crashes down and all i can see now is the surface of dark oceans and i'm underneath that surface, inhaling smoke and smoldering memories and bleeding fragments of gray and blue bruises in my sore vision and glitching tenderly, agonizingly,

WHERE-WHER-WHE-WH-W

am

I

i see blinding lights slashing through my vision and i hear myself talking to strangers but i'm not actually there / faces close in and lips meet my skin and when i wake up in the morning i'll be in the arms of a stranger but i'm drowning too fast to notice-

ROSELIN.

ROSELIN.

ROSELIN.

ROSELIN.

i have never seen the light.

{ the world fades away }

roselin.

your name feels like everything good in the world.

we're on the rooftop watching the world die beneath us. we're watching death staining faded branches, splashes of bronze and dull tangerine, shades of FALLING.

you're sketching the city below with such precision that it looks a thousand times more beautiful, more real. you smile, slightly, your lips forming into a perfect curve, like the arch of a rainbow or like the curvature of the earth seen from the perspective of a plane window. the freckles on your cheeks are like the stray clouds in the sky, floating absentmindedly over your face like the autumn leaves flying down to kiss the sidewalk. your eyes match the shade of your dark blue coat, so black that the blue is barely noticeable unless you stare for at least 5 seconds. a beige scarf hangs loosely around your shoulders.

"what do you draw?" i ask you,

my head is filled with water and there are earthquakes in my knees- so high, so high. what if i f-fall?

"i draw everything i can see,"

the waves in my mind boil and thrash like beats from ancient tales. except they're real. the monsters are real.

"but aren't our eyes limited?"

you turn and look at me, your eyes wide. swirled with blue, swirled with light in the surfaces of dark water. and then you smiled at me, eyes half closing and your laughter blending with the piano notes from below, your face filled with light. i'd never seen you smile like that. it turned my world sideways.

i want to be the reason you smile like that.

"they are limited,"

dark water. cold. drowning. fading. falling.

"but our hearts aren't,"

{ fading, fading }

i see you again, we're in the park under autumn leaves, cold in a bittersweet way.

"what's the most beautiful thing in the world?" i ask you,

"hmmm... it's the small things that make a difference. like the first leaf that falls in autumn or the way a kitten blinks at a dragonfly on a warm april morning or the way a waved line in the concrete can make you feel so melancholy. how about you?"

i want to be closer to you.

"the most beautiful thing in the world is someone's humanity,"

your eyes, of darkness flecked with blue, as warm as july and as sad as october, as dark as december. human, like april, like april.

"do you believe you're beautiful?"

your hair streaks through the wind as it rises,

"no,"

and you looked at me then, as if i had a purpose in the world. looked at me as if i were worthy of you. with a gaze so certain, so certain, so certain.

"no, no you are beautiful,"

i don't know what i was doing then, when i grabbed your scarf with one hand and your collar with another but all i know was that i've never been happier, when i pulled you toward me and kissed you with my heart beating like storming waves, like beating raindrops against the concrete and explosions happening at an atomic level. and you kissed me back as if there was never a time when we were strangers. and then we pulled away and what happened next was all a blur: i took your hand and we ran, to the trees by that pond and when i look back your eyes are stunned and your hair is flying and you asked me "why?"

because you're always there when i want to see you. because your eyes look like light breaking over dark water. because your like being on top of a high building, i'm fucking terrified but its so beautiful just being there that i can't resist, because-

"because i like you,"

the faded stars in the fading sunset sky gleam. and you say,

"i- i like you too,"

{ further fading }

and your words echo and ripple as the memory dissolves like those soft november days

&

i'm drowning again

except

blue flecks fill my vision, blue flecks shimmering in the distance against the surface of the water.

light tears the dark away softly, like pages ripping apart at the seams of the poem i could never be. there is blue up ahead, warm blue perfect blue blue like-

your voice echoes and fades into focus and it feels so much closer right now, blooming like strawberry raindrops.

there's a hand reaching down, fingertips underwater, fingertips reaching for mine. when i take it, it doesn't let go.

"come, let's go home,"

{ and the world sharpens back to reality }

my head's hurting too hard to remember when i moved but all i know is that i'm sitting on a bench outside, under street lights. music from the party blasts in the distance, not so faraway. it's snowing.

i scroll through my contacts until i find your name.

"could you come over?"

"why?"

"the snow's pretty,"

"where are you?"

"i think i'm drunk,"

i'm laughing and i don't know why. the world fades in and out, muddled and out of focus. cold. where am i. what am i who am i why am i how am i-

"alright, i'll come get you," your voice feels like clarity, through the phone,

"to where?"

"home. let's go home,"