#writingalchemy

You think of me as a checkmark,

a box to tick and leave behind.

You don’t consider me the way you think you do.

I was a niche for you to explore,

a category to brag about,

a story to savor for later—like an obscure dish

described by better-traveled friends.

You still tell yourself you’re better.

You deserve better.

You covet it.

Yet you never improved yourself for better.

You assumed the world was unworthy,

even as you couldn’t keep anyone

for more than three to six seasons.

I knew you were seasonal from the start.

I knew I was practice.

I let you believe me oblivious.

With age comes experience,

but yours has not taught you.

You still believe yourself better

by nature of existing.

That arrogance has left you wanting.

Your resentment is a coating you cannot hide;

it reflects back at you.

That’s why you pivot, pointing out flaws in others

whenever you see the glare.

You’re angry they never wanted you at your age.

They didn’t want you younger.

Now you’re older, and still,

you cannot grasp what you crave.

The crisis is here, but you’re flailing,

refusing surrender.

Age brings humility to those who earn wisdom.

Surrender is the passage; it heals the pain

of perpetual dissatisfaction.

Eventually, we learn to be satisfied.

But how can you,

when you’ve never let another’s uneven breath

fall upon your own uneven clavicle?

Never let flawed skin sink against yours?

You’ll never admit it, but you have stretch marks, too.

You’ve forgotten: flaws connect us

in the only real way possible.

You were seduced by a perfection

you could never hold.

g.m. Raines

in the moonlight,

traced sigils on your ribs,

outlining each rose.

Mangled dreams

slipped between the seams

of your sighs.

You said you’d felt something real—

for the first time in forever.

But it was over

before it began.

I told you this was nothing new,

at least not for me.

You said that made you sad.

I asked why?

You had no answer.

And after that,

not many words remained—

only your apology.

I didn’t understand why you were sorry.

This was life.

This was normal

for people like me.

Not many can sit in the pauses,

when a writer craves words

over shared wine,

solitude over shared air.

I think you were one of the few

who understood.

But you had other realms to haunt,

no more time for mine.

So you laid yourself down—

one last drink,

one last time.

Levees–

To feel anything is to feel everything at once.

The levees have failed.

There is nothing to hold back

the rising flood.

It is the artist’s plight,

and also our power.

If only we could learn to channel this water,

instead of spending our lives

building walls against it.

But to create is to surrender.

to be the flood itself–

untamed, unboxed,

unbridled.

PETRIFICATION–

I flayed myself for you—

peeled back flesh,

layer by layer.

Revealing the architecture

of raw want.

Tendons. Bones.

No armor left.

I knew these winds.

Still I knelt.

Find me now, years later–

a stone figure

in the wash.

Press your hand

to my sandstone ribs—

does memory keep

the warmth

of skin

that trusted?

You asked for truth.

I gave you a topography

even the vultures avoid.

@writerraines

Black Roses–

I laid you down

in the moonlight,

traced sigils on your ribs,

outlining each rose.

Mangled dreams

slipped between the seams

of your sighs.

You said you’d felt something real—

for the first time in forever.

But it was over

before it began.

I told you this was nothing new,

at least not for me.

You said that made you sad.

I asked why?

You had no answer.

And after that,

not many words remained—

only your apology.

I didn’t understand why you were sorry.

This was life.

This was normal

for people like me.

Not many can sit in the pauses,

when a writer craves words

over shared wine,

solitude over shared air.

I think you were one of the few

who understood.

But you had other realms to haunt,

no more time for mine.

So you laid yourself down—

one last drink,

one last time.

–g.m. Raines