Dreams fall to the wayside like stars plummeting down trapped by the weight of gravity, reality.

Optimism and innocence of youth corroding over time, rusting, corrupting into unrecognizable shapes of disfigurement.

The wonder and awe transforms into repetition and cynicism as each passing day reaffirms the mundane.

Thoughts once freed by tongues never leave their confines, imprisonment in a mind, product of society.

To deny ourselves our childhood ambitions is to deny the restraints of what we know;

That perhaps our wills have been broken by these small realizations taught through age.

Our ideas of ourselves misaligning with the products of our actions, toiling into obscurity.

Never stated but always implied; one leaves no choice, but two comes with bias.

Quicker to forgive, easier to assist, harder to leave.

Words are never needed with actions speaking clear to the child of ire.

Object of affection means another unattended, seeking approval.

The favored offspring reaps the bounty of the problem child.

But coddling and chiding turns into soft skin waiting to be torn.

The hum of the television syncs to the beat of my heart, resonating and pulsing through his head on my chest.

The rise and fall of his breath, Light dancing on his sleepy lids, blood warming more than blankets as our bodies sink into the mattress.

Countless nights are spent feeling instead of seeing, hearing instead of speaking, in between dreaming and reality.

Every day slowly melts away to electric, fictional universes with tangible companionship on our journey to tomorrow.

The moonlit night was tranquil, stars littering the edges of inky blackness not touched by lunar rays. It’s these nights that brought him back to the sea in spite of her temper, past the breaking waves and out to the still waters that quieted his aging mind. He used to fish before the break of dawn, but now he sat on the bow of his vessel and relished in the silence.

The ocean never frightened him like it did his wife. She refused to join him on his escapades for fear of the unknown lurking in the deep. He never quite understood her superstitions and comforted himself with experiential knowledge of his many years at sea. There were a couple of close calls, but most of them were the consequences of his own drunken tomfoolery. Besides, he knew how to swim.

But on this night as he began to prepare his vessel for the voyage home, he noticed a disruption in the twinkling abyss on the horizon. Each star dispersed and rippled to the side as a shape inched towards him, just below the surface of the water. The moon cast eerie shadows on the shape just below the surface, almost imperceptible to his tired eyes.

Whales weren’t uncommon in these parts, but their movements were usually slower, lazy. This creature advanced towards his ship at an alarming rate, creating waves in its wake that began to reach his craft. The boat bobbed up and down as he tried to glean a better look at the thing barreling towards him. Straining, he braced himself against the rail and leaned forward. Curiosity and a twinge of fear overtook his mind as he grasped the sheer magnitude of the unknown being.

And then it was upon him. The night sky reflected in the water around his boat disappeared into inky blackness, choppy waves and the ominous creaking of his sails accompanying it. For a moment, he panicked. Perhaps it was an orca ready to claim its next meal, toying with him like it does a seal on an ice float. Or perhaps it was something worse, a spawn of the depths not yet known to man. At least, not survived by mankind.

In an instant, his boat lurched, sending him sprawling backwards on the deck. His head banged against the metal, leaving him with a ringing in his ears and a blurry image of the white ring centered above him. He never noticed how lonely the moon looked before, shining weakly in the sky only to be replaced with a brighter light. How it waxed and waned only to have a single night to appear complete to the earthlings below. The comfort he once found in its solitude became a warning: he was alone.

His wife was right to fear.

Foundations in the chaos A tangled set of roots Planting firm in currents of time Nourishing the body

Weaving through the ground Over stones, under streets Around manmade structures To find forgotten earth

To be uprooted is to die To not have belief or support To be rooted is to be alive To grow and to love

The water glass on my bedside Table smells of hard spirits; It took my spirit after a bullet And two boys took the lives Of two other boys, One my friend. On my old phone I scroll To the texts of a dead man I read the nonchalant, The mundane messages, So normal and yet They say so much more now. The news left me speechless But my fingers flew fast Typing one last text to the Body of a boy I once held, His hands big and soft and warm, His lips bigger and softer and warmer, Now small and cold and hard. So many things I wanted to say, So many things left unsaid, There was so much to say and yet So little I could recall in the Numb stupor of my shock. The words I could remember So clearly, they stung so deeply, Were “I’m so sorry, Josh.” Press send. Red exclamation. The message will never deliver. The time stamp, two years later, Two years since we talked And yet the touch of this boy Touched me more than I knew, Didn’t know until I couldn’t tell him. Cascading down my face Is a wet waterfall of regret, Pooling onto my pillow, There are no more words To describe losing something, someone I never even knew I had.

There’s serendipity in solitude, a sweetness in the silence. the loud and aching hearts of men fall to disarray and violence. But the bitter meets its bitter end when left to console the mind, lacking companionship in anger leaving ourselves more kind. Fall gently into the void of solitude, forget your woes and sleep. When the light of morning comes, we’re only left our souls to keep. The sky full of stars seems dead and cold; a place once so magical now hurts to behold.

pitter patter of the rain drops drop, drop, dropping on my window sill thoughts I entertain then let lie still within the stillness of the morning, mourning the loss of sleep, it’s 4am and I’m at a loss for words, words I tried to keep and then I let slip away along with the light of day, what a light burden to pay for a prayer of sanity

My thoughts aren’t novel, but each one I have layers on top of each other and builds to a new revelation, strengthening synapses and firing repetitively. We are told we are wasting our youth, pushing the boundaries of what it means to be alive and testing our limits. Sometimes it’s living life to the fullest, and other times it’s indulging in tomfoolery that will either make for a reminisce or a cautionary tale. In the moment it’s exhilarating, frightening, explosive, and flickers out as quickly as it burst into existence.

What does it mean to be young? The old will say it’s inexperience, a lack of knowledge that comes from the weathering of life and hardening of our souls. Others will say it’s strength, the promise of infinite possibilities and self-determinism. Ultimately, I think it’s self-discovery, a process we forget all too often as we age. Do I have the courage to advocate for myself, to fail, to learn, to grow? Or will I resist change? Will I stagnate?

We forget these simple questions that unite us as humans, weaving together the threads of the fabric of time across generations. We scorn at the actions and behaviors of those we do not understand, those who are a culmination of life experiences we have not felt and understood. We look to othering, we hurt as we are hurt, and yet we still cannot seek to reach compromise between our future and past selves. We seek to sympathize rather than empathize, pulling from our stale memories on the shelf or lack thereof, trying to paint a picture without reference. I know what it is to be 22 now, in this moment. Will I remember these feelings when I am old and gray? I write fervently in the hopes that I never forget these thoughts, that I engrain them into my being so I can recall them and bridge a historic divide when I am frail and powerless after a life of agency.

I know that everything has been said before by someone other than me, and it will be said again by another 22 year old at 2 am a century from now, reflecting on the state of the world in all her beauty and brokenness. But it is novel to me, molding me and shaping me as a person. Marking my growth as an adult, one epiphany at a time. Right now, to be young is to be scared. To be excited. To be loved and to feel love. To want and to need. To listen and tell my story. And I will keep feeling these throughout the years, each in its own context, continually creating more layers until I forget them entirely. Until I fade away, both from the earth and all its memories. In the end, we are all lost without purpose, making it up for ourselves as we go. And yet, we do not see. We do not hear. We battle each other as we try to make the world our own, but do not realize we are all the same.

Each person has differences in their environments, a unique formula that codes their personality. But to be human is to feel. We all feel content, grief, anger, awe, and love. We are wired to feel as we experience, we interpret each happening the same. We are still unique in minute ways, but in the end, we share a commonality. We share consciousness, because we are the universe made conscious.