a splash of cream, a sprinkle of the cosmos

❝ — ° shen yue gif pack !

Girl wraps self in a shroud of the ash of her own skin, in cloak of broken piano strings. Eyes open and stinging. Hair hanging like a noose, like fingers around her neck. / She’s born red and reckless, with a heart so full it threatens to burst and this is a tragedy. She’s born looking for fights, with knees scabbed over, with mosquito bites punctuating thin calves, with grass stains on bare feet. She’s born. There’s a roaring in her blood and when she smiles, the earth shivers. / He’s beautiful like a bullet, but the story’s still the same. She wore pointe shoes and protruded ribs for someone who was a shadow. With each inhale, the cold ink stained the insides black, blacker blackest (how can you love me if I’m not here? how can you love me if I’m already on my knees?). Death tasted like secrets dissolved into faded parchment and the things she could still pretend to love. How do you love me if their blood’s on my hands? / She’s a girl, and she wakes with mildew. She’s a girl, and her hands still shake. She’s a girl, and he’d told her she could be great and it’s a goddamn tragedy because when people see her they romanticize the martyrdom of survival and forget she’d believed him. There’s caution tape around her heart, and it reads: I am tearing myself in two. / Girl with rebellion where a heart should be. Girl with red lipstick and chewing up ghost stories and spitting out the smoke. Girl with bandaged knees and broken ribs. Girl breathes; girl says “I am. I am. I am.” / ( We’re called survivors because we’re still here. )

TREECHADA PETCHARAT

She refused to be bored, chiefly because she wasn’t boring.

For she had a great variety of selves.

It hurts to fake a smile, but I do it anyway to prove that I’m stronger than I really am. To prove that I still exist.