liminal

Some days I feel like I cannot continue like this. I make coffee each morning, pretend that life is something worth living. I avoid the dread that sinks to the pit of my stomach because it is the only thing I have taught myself to do. Days pass and everything remains the same. Neutral and unresolved. No matter whether the sun shines or the rain pours, life stays blue from dawn until dusk.

I’ll watch condensation ripple across blades of grass, breathing in the sweetness of early morning. Nothing can reach me in this moment, suspended beneath clouds resting at dew point. I remember lying here once before, watching stars and wishing for more than time could ever give me—young and naive, placing her faith somewhere it never quite belonged.

Each night, I spot Venus in the unending distance. I remember everything and I cry for everyone. I wonder what it is about me that makes devotion feel implausible. The leaves begin to die, and the world turns grey; my room becomes frozen in a moment where only my misery survives. Light filters through the windows just so, shadows spilling across blank walls—almost liminal. Everything feels like old film, and there are not enough words in the world to describe it. The silence is loud, the air softer—like it is longing for a beauty unrecognisable. I reach for paper, a pen, but no patience can persuade the feeling onto the page. No matter how hard I scrape scars into it.

The ocean will sing to me, and I will sigh in return. Ghostlike, I slip in and out of a character forged for adoration. I’ll sit in silence and wonder why it feels as if I must beg for understanding—why my tears tell a story my words seem unable to communicate. A heart born for poetry, destined to be misunderstood.

The rain and I die side by side. The sun sets and the world continues to revolve. Each year passes, and I am still fifteen—my skin holding onto things I have yet to understand. The sky bleeds from blue to pink to purple until it no longer holds shape. I go to sleep heavy in bone, while the ravens watch from my backyard fence, confused that I am still breathing.

Still, I wake.