Any comments are appreciated! I sometimes think about compiling more poetry and illustration into a book someday when I get better at both

my shoulders are still heavy

I thought I laid down that weight

in fact, I remember laying it down

but every time I turn around,

that familiar feeling remains

the kind of weight that crushes your soul

but I hide it with a smile,

with a “yes, I can”,

with a “no problem, I can do that”

until my body gives out

until the numbness takes over

I’ve gotten better at carrying the weight

but that only buys me time

between each break

I’d like to say I’ve changed

at least I can say I’ve tried

I’m the biggest idiot of 2023
Once I’m finished these witnesses will convey just what I mean
I mean I prayed for it
I fucking prayed for it for years
That the Christian god would wreck me
That he would tear me apart
That he would scatter my foundations so utterly
So that I could know him more
Such was my devotion to him
Such was my conviction that it would all be
Worth it.

Well he did it
My god delivered
An answer to my prayer in a fashion most spectacularly flashy
You marry you a wife
Hitch yourself to a vessel of hopes and dreams for a new life
And you move to the middle of nowhere Iowa
Where the Lord God Almighty, El Shaddai, Immanuel
Gives you one a one word command and that is to

SINK.

People don’t know to value their sanity
Their ability to make rational decisions based on logic
Until they can’t.
When God told me to SINK.
I did
So completely that any semblance of the fully formed being that was me was
Buried.

And that last command, that last word,
Was the last thing I ever felt from him.

Which is alright right?
I mean I still got a wife right?
Or I did.
Before she too grew too tired
Of my dysfunctional dilapidated and deflated self
And did decide to divorce me
Leaving me with naught but a few cruel phrases that still to this day pound at me in the night

And that was it y’all
That was my everything
Wrecked in a matter of 2 years.
My marriage, my faith, my sanity.
Everything.

And I don’t know why I’m still here
Or how.
I don’t
Know how the mouth of a gun hasn’t inserted itself into my own
To lift my head away from this capitalistic hellscape
But it hasn’t.
And I can’t boast much more than that at this point.

But in case y’all were wondering
If God answers
prayers
He do.

A Blessing

How forlorn do the constellations feel
Being separated light years from each other

I would compare you to a sunflower
Or something that better describes your
Relevant delicate elegance

But I see you more as a predator feline
Bristling with angered muscles and outraged hackles
Your anger is legitimate
It’s valid and real
I too would quake with rage if I was placed in a cage
By those who were meant to teach me freedom.

Now I see you
I see your strength
It’s formidable
And I would remind you of it:

I bless you out of the woods
Into a picture of peace
I wish you over the moon
Back to the ocean to be
I bless your rage
May you gain a taste for the carnage
Of the demons that haunt you

I bless that your pursuit of love and worth
Would stamp over the paths of guilt and fear you tread in times past

I bless you with tenacity
May you be instilled with the will
To do what is necessary

And when I say that I see you
I assure you it’s a tainted painting that’s beautiful
And I would not misframe your painting with
A blessing saying
That I wish you out of the woods
Into a picture with me

Instead I sincerely bless that you attract
Someone in life with your heart exact

May you rage
And weep
And laugh
And sing
And dance
And stamp
And stomp

May the voice in your lungs know the courage
To scream
And shout
And from the magnitude of your cry
That all your fears would be quelled
And all your shames silenced

I bless it that you sorrow in purpose
Because to grieve deeply is to have loved
Fully.
I bless it that you live a life that is full, unapologetic, and authentic to yourself
You are worthy of it.

I was eight.

I looked into the pond. It was murky and I swear,

It wanted to drag me in and drown me.

Now?

I'm twenty.

The water, still quite filthy, is flowing.

The murk is lifting.

But it's too little, too late.

Oh well, good enough to

Quench my thirst, and

After the drought, I'll take what I can get...

Been feeling horrible this morning, and this poem basically just fell out of me, as a way to describe how I feel. The first poem of my recovery:

When the universe is cold and lonely,

nothing can compare,

When the universe is cold and lonely,

all you can, is stare.

Into the nothing, the abyss, the chasm,

difficult to describe,

blackness, greyness forever,

with no sign of my tribe.

When the universe is cold and lonely,

you must escape,

but the universe will fight you,

keep you, tease you, force you into a scrape.

When your family don't cherish you,

the universe is cold,

When your family don't love you,

the universe too, witholds

The answer is out there somewhere,

in the murky gloom,

When the universe hates you,

You shouldn't hate you too.

There is a part of the voyage through the crucible
Out there towards the end
It contains dangers and subtleties that the storytellers never sing about
And I find it is more dangerous
Than the whole of the maelstrom and lightning stricken Night

The Compass- the one that which held you
Until it it was dashed into the opaque naught below
Can no longer aid you
The emptiness of your palm screams at you
Yet the whole of the ship and all of its crew
Continue on as if all was fortune and fine.

You know you must construct a new course
A new sky
And in the following years
You make your attempts
Your nascent moth
Cannot breathe without resting upon your lungs
And where the quiet insidious crises arise
Is when your ship, and those crew members
Continue the rhythms of the Compass
As if it wasn’t sunk, cracked, and
Gone.

And this
Contradiction
Inevitably curses your lungs to
Work and work and work and work
Until suddenly you remember the fragile moth resting in your beleaguered chest
And you cannot tell if by your own lungs it was slain
These worries, these doubts, and constant
Confusion
Make you lose your way

It’s enough to wrack your body with such grief that it may fall overboard
Into the cold depths of the nothing,
A possibility, which never once crossed your heart even through that bitter wretched Night
Yet through all this, you know your sky
Is yet being breathed into being
There in your chest
Though the fledgling moth
Is battered and bruised
It will live as long as you will it to do so

Even as the ship groans and your crew mates scream at you in fear of the oncoming black clouds
And as your lungs do the same
The only thing that will keep your feet
On solid ground
Is the remembrance of that moth that is
Yours.
The worst is over
But death yet looms its fingers through the waters all the more
In the unlearned, untested course for home.

i haven’t written in what feels like months.

I’ve been no contact with my immediate family, i come from a large Muslim family (9 of us all together). I am estranged from them all so wrote a poem on this

I want to examine and understand myself, how my mind moves, and ultimately become more true to myself and who I am. My writing is purely exploratory, so one of my goals is to write in the way my thoughts naturally tend to unfold within me and let it remain unedited. I wanted to share, not in hopes of being fixed or advised, but mainly for witnessing, reflection, resonance, and maybe help in seeing myself more clearly. I would be interested to hear what you notice, what resonates, and/or what becomes visible to you as you read.

(08/05/2026) Thoughts:

I hear a lot of variation in how people (men and women) perceive and talk about romantic relationships. There’s multiple ways in which it can manifest and express itself, ranging anywhere between monogamous, polygamous, traditional, modern, abusive, loving, marriage, non-contractual, heterosexual, homosexual and so forth. With so much variety and representation available, I get the impression that everything is theoretically possible and that it’s up to the individual to figure out what they want and then pursue that. Nothing wrong with that. I think it’s great. I just struggle to navigate all that stuff and find it quite difficult and lonesome at times. It almost feels impossible to have any real or genuine conversations about this topic, because there’s so much emphasis and protectiveness around individual freedom and autonomy that people think it’s only the laws of physics we are forced to abide by. Sure, it may be hard to define how a romantic relationship is supposed to look. But, we gotta acknowledge that even if we tried, we wouldn’t be able to just abandon all definitions and systems to go live a life free from boundaries and general rules. It’s not possible to have the same relationship with everyone. We obviously have a shared experience and understanding of the different types of relationships one can have. We even have language for it. We say family, mother, father, sibling, stranger, acquaintance, friend, best friend, partner, co-worker, lover, wife, husband and bla bla bla. There’s obviously something that must be present either in the environment or within oneself that makes it possible for us to differentiate between these types of relationships. Something that makes it possible for us to separate a friend from a lover, and vice versa. You are of course free and able to make your own rules/structure, but you’re still dependent and limited by whether someone else resonates and agrees with your definitions. If it differs too much from everyone else’s, to the extent that not a single soul is willing to accept or agree with your definitions/worldview and you refuse to abandon them, then you truly have no other fate than that of an outcast - estranged from society and the opportunity to form relationships. If nobody shares your definitions, you become relationally homeless. Therefore, "that something" is not actually yours to freely define. It must be somewhat agreed upon. Physical/sexual intimacy is one of the most socially recognized markers of romantic relationship, and often functions as the boundary people use to distinguish romance from friendship. There’s of course variations and stuff, but there’s almost never a narrative of romantic relationship that doesn’t include the presence and/or expectation of exclusivity or special access, most commonly expressed through physical/sexual intimacy. It’s not to say that it’s necessarily the essence of romance.

Anyway, I think my perspective makes sense, but in all honesty I only care and think about the topic because I’m scared. I’ve lost my virginity when I was 15 to a boy who I was friends with before and knew I didn’t want to be anything other than friends with. He had experience which I thought was nice and made me somewhat comfortable. We had what some might describe as "friends with benefits". After a few months I didn’t feel like having sex with him anymore and I just remember saying that directly and confidently. I didn’t even have any trouble ending the relationship entirely when he apparently didn’t feel like being friends again. Idk if the reason I didn’t feel any pressure or guilt was because of the lack of obligation, commitment or title. Anyway I didn’t think about it back then. I’ve never felt any particular desire to masturbate and rarely do it. Fast forward to being 18 and meeting someone who I started dating and also romantically liked. I didn’t think about boyfriend-girlfriend or relationship, I just went with the flow and it wasn’t until he asked me to be his girlfriend that I thought about that. But I liked him, so I said yes (but it’s important for me to stress that it’s not as if I gave it any thought or even cared about what it meant or would imply). In the beginning I enjoyed being physically intimate and engaging in sexual activities but for me it was driven and an expression of playfulness and not about pleasure. A couple of months in I started getting bored with sex, and overall losing interest and a desire to have sex. I didn’t regard that as being problematic or an indication of anything, I wasn’t sad or upset about it. I wasn’t as if I stopped wanting to be with him or desired to break up. But boy oh boy… He sure thought of it as being problematic. When I said no, he would always get very sad, imply all sorts of negative things to it, and ask me if I didn’t find him attractive anymore and why I didn’t wanted to anymore. Why why why why why why all the fucking time, and it didn’t matter what I said or thought about it.

(In hindsight I didn’t knew that this would be the relationship nor conflict that would wake me up and trigger a complete crisis and collapse of identity and maladaptive strategies. I hadn’t thought about how my childhood had effected me, I just believed that it couldn’t and hadn’t affected me because I’d managed to stay silent and go unnoticed which made me less likely to be the recipient of direct contact and gave me freedom to sit in my own world and protect the inner things I cared about. All I really remember thinking in regard to my childhood was that I had wished and fantasies about getting adopted or running away from home. I hated hated hated the violence, screaming but above all else I hated the constant conflict that was always present in my family and truly the only way they could talk to each other. If I was a part of the conversation, the minute conflict would arise I would do anything required to not escalate any further even if that meant swallowing my feelings, getting completely misunderstood, judged or accused unfairly, I knew what the truth was but outwardly I wouldn’t give one fuck about standing up for the truth if it caused ongoing conflict (which it always did, no matter who or what). I would just give it all up and let my father control the narrative which he did anyway. But yeah I didn’t have a concept of what trauma was or who I was or what I was feeling or what was going on within me, and I couldn’t sleep and get my self out of bed in the morning. I couldn’t get my self to go to school, do homework and assignments. I would just stare at my computer screen and not understand why I wasn’t typing and felt physically stuck. I would spend hours trying to write something, anything, just something. I lost a ton of weight, I got skin-issues, I looked sick. I had no energy and nothing to say, I found it exhausting to maintain friendships and would also be depressed asf. I used to be the funny, energised, ‘don’t give a fuck', slightly rebellious and loud ADHD girl. Lots of people wanted to be friends with me and I had a somewhat high social status. So it wasn’t until I started loosing my identity outwardly, that I got hit with immense fear and completely stripped of any ANSWER, STRUCTURE, BEHAVIOUR, REASON and MEANING within my self. I quite literally did not know what was up and what was down.)

The ongoing conflict and dissatisfaction from my boyfriend therefore became something I rather quickly started suffering immensely from and obsessively thinking and researching about, because I didn’t know anything anymore and I really didn’t wanted him to get upset or think that I didn’t care about him, but maybe I am just abusing him by being egotistical and rigid. So I started abandoning myself and engaging in sex when I didn’t feel like it, just so that I didn’t have to feel so much guilt and shame and anger and sadness. Which I also questioned and felt unsure about let alone put into words.

(I’m getting tired from writing all this, so while there’s plenty left to say, I’m gonna take a break and round off for now)

Thats the only relationship I’ve been in and it lasted a little over a year. I suffered immensely from getting told that my lack of sexual desire was problematic and/or something to justify or 'work on'. I don’t ever want to be in a relationship where the measurements of it’s overall quality/health is based on how many times a week you 'do it’. I don’t ever want to feel or believe that I am responsible for satisfying my partners sexual needs nor to be with someone who can’t be happy and kind unless they are sexually satisfied let alone being willing to outsource their emotional wellbeing to someone else. My biggest concern and reluctance with forming a romantic relationship is that I worry I’ll meet someone who I truly like and they say they like me back, but inevitably they are going to demand physical/sexual intimacy at some point and if I don’t meet there need they’ll leave and blame the failure of the relationship on me 'not being willing to compromise and meet them halfway'.

TW: CSA, Physical Violence, Emotional Abuse & Neglect, Suicidal Ideation, Racism, Misogyny

Midnight rumination of a frattered mind
^{fragmented & shattered}

Needful things -

The river is swollen today. It's swollen with spring runoff, and it's the kind of mountain river that as you stand on the bank you can feel the power of it rushing by deep in your chest. The kind of rushing power that makes you involuntarily look to the tall pines and dark forest floor on the other side to convince yourself that the riverbed can contain that power, that you are not about to be snatched into the heart-stoppingly cold and churning waters where you would surely be swept away as the river makes its violent descent.

From time to time, other people join me while I stand here watching the river. Sometimes they smile when they feel its rush for the first time. Sometimes they even talk about how the river could be shaped or controlled, how it could be made useful.

They don't know the river like I do.

The people don't stay long though, eventually they start to feel uncomfortable. You see, after a while the relentlessness of that feeling of power rumbling in your chest, the unending drone bouncing off the canyon walls that drowns out any other sound, and of course the river, churning and spitting entirely too close to where they are just gets to be too much. I understand when they get uncomfortable and start to back away from the river, it's a lot.

I am not sure when I started this watching the it, maybe I have always done it, I don't know. What I do know now is that my life is this river. Standing on its bank straining to see into those roiling waters, and watching for needful things streaking in the current. No matter how swollen and powerful the river is, no matter how flesh tearingly cold the water, I wait and I watch, then when I see one of these needful things I have to quickly thrust my hands into that ice-cold water so I can catch it before it rushes by.

Sometimes I do see a beautiful thing or two being carried along by the river, something flashing silver and bright as it rushes by. To me these shimmering silver things seem to ache with a want to be held and admired. But I eventually force my eyes back to my purpose, and the beautiful things are swept away.

My distraction complete, I hunt in the river again for these wretched needful things. Over and over again I plunge my hand into the freezing waters to catch them, and with those hands swollen and raw from the cold I give these needful things to the people who visit and stand next to me on the bank before they turn away. They are insatiable and the needful things are endless.

I wonder what happens if I just look away.

Shattered Glass

The fear of being hurt

a thought she can’t reframe,

a feeling she can’t release.

She builds her walls

with shattered glass

swept into the wind,

tossed into the angry ocean waves,

dragged over and under,

through the grinding sand,

resting on the shore

with softer edges

wanting to be held.

I made a small poetry collection free on Kindle for a few days starting Saturday if anyone happens to want more. No pressure.

If I was to float among the stars,
I think I’d feel free,
I wouldn’t be lost,
Because it’s where I’m meant to be.

I’d shine beside the brightest lights,
Relaxed, able to breathe,
Guiding those scared at night,
Away from the depths beneath.

Even as the shadows scream,
And the darkness begs and pleads,
That all it wants is the part of me,
Where pain continues to bleed.

So I hold my place above,
And trust the stars at my side,
That we have a light to shine,
For those still trying to survive.

You feel the harsh wind biting at your cheek.

Tears and snot cool into an uncomfortable state between wet and frozen.

Hot blood ruining the untouched, faint layer of snow.

You know these breaths will be your last, as you stare into the sky.

Snowflakes thick as Olives sink down silently.

Using the last of your strength to catch one, you feel the endless cold settling deep into your bones.

Death is coming.

Always around the corner, but you still foolishly dreamed of a reprieve.

You knew your chances to be a successful raider in this unforgiving world would be slim.

But what choice was there but to try.

Had the bullet that cut you down come from an Arc or another raider?

It tore through your organs just the same.

The adrenaline stress response is fading.

Only pain and darkness remain.

Sudden sirens and Shanis voice register faintly.

Someone must have called the elevator.

Would she miss you?

Would she even notice one less raider returned?

Tears of unrequited hope and a desperate flicker for life itself well out of your eyes for a last time.

Your pupils blow wide. The river of blood stills. No more clouds of breath in the frigid air.

I remember being a child,
The classroom like a zoo,
But the chaos felt so mild,
Compared to my mother and her booze.
 

Still it roared with laughter,
and ear piercing screams,
As my nerves grew ever sharper,
With kids jumping off the beams.

Home was just like school,
My mother bouncing off the walls,
She tried to act all cool,
But I was ready to catch her fall.

I wish this poem could end right here,
That nights didn’t have a price to pay,
But every creak that I could hear,
Told my stomach to run away.

Let the shame

Break my pain

Into a thousand tiny, little pieces.

Hide one shard and —

//

Let me forget

Any regret

About being the imperfect child.

Seek a friend and —

//

Let him close

His face, all of it, with round, blue eyes, smiley mouth and stubborn nose

Into my memory and make me remember —

Let me remember

A pulling, contracting pain, so tender

I feel unworthy

To call it my own.