When he began to write

It was for release

It was for show

His words were a sad performance

A dance to a funeral march

And so when the bad feelings went away

So did the words

The bad, unimpressive words

And he forgot about his dance

He collected his words and hid them away

As if he’d never written

But when they began to write

A group of joy and creativity

He followed suit

He wrote with meaning

He...

The magic fading is never fun. Drifting away is never easy. Maybe it’s absent mindedness, or maybe it’s the fact that the damn app refuses to show you any more personalised prompts.

One may never know...

His touch is graphite

His breath, the flutter of paper

His eyes are pools of ink

And his soul is unwritten words

Her mind is swirling concepts

Her mouth is full of unspoken ideas

Her hands are smudged and stained

And her heart is written out in neat print

The room is cluttered and clean

The air is full of murmurs and half-finished lyrics

The floor is covered in abandoned writings

And in the midd...

“Finding a way into tricky situations has never been a problem for me— although I still haven’t learned the art of getting out of them.”

“What the hell did you do?”

“Nothing! Nothing! Relax, it’s fine.”

It was not fine. But I am quite a convincing liar, if I do say so myself.

“You could not be less convincing.”

Hmm. Maybe my skills work better when they’re not over the phone.

I wiggled and...

It was scary, at first. The feeling. The weird tickle I get on my lips when people I love kiss other people. I thought at first it was only romantic. The first time it happened, I was told five minutes later that Tyler had kissed Jesse on the swing set. But that belief faded quickly. For one, my parents were definitely never romantic for me. But my father kissed my mother and there it was. And the...

I glared at him over the candles. “Dude, we’re 25, it’s just a tradition, just let me make the stupid wish.”

Jonah glared right back. “You can’t say it out loud! It won’t come true otherwise!”

I groaned and rolled my eyes. Jonah had always been like this, and it had been more endearing when we were kids, I believed the stuff he said. But I had to comply, so I blew out my candles, wishing I didn’...

The forest had always been my place. It was my escape from everything, where I could lay and read and sing and talk about whatever I wanted without judgmental stares. Birds and bugs weren’t rude like people, they’d like anyone well enough if they gave them seeds and sugar water.

But the forest wasn’t only my place. It was others, too, like the birds and the bugs and the squirrels and the trees. ...

“You two are like lemmings. One goes, then the next. If you jumped, she’d go too.”

That was what everyone had told me growing up. That my sister and I were two peas in a pod, puzzle pieces, two halves of a whole. The lemming comparison was uniquely my grandfather. But it got the same message across: my sister and I were alike in every way that mattered, except unlike any other comparison, he ackn...

It is bright and bursting light

It is bubbles in champagne

Glinting and gleaming and beaming

It is gentle glow

Internal fire

A hearth in the heart

It is cackles and snorts and aching cheeks

It is hugs and blankets and snuggles

It is the quiet after something important has been said

It is the sun and moon and stars

It is gorgeous

It is everything the world could ever provide...

Snow settled onto the walkways

Piling on rooftops

Fluttering down onto frosted garden beds

The air so cold

Breaths caught in its icy molasses

Slogging footsteps

Sluggish moves

Frozen fingers weary in movement

Barely keeping grip on the blanket that warmed them

Eyes barely open against the flaming warmth

The air inside was thick with quiet and heat

Muffling the world

While the white outside coa...