My grandmother always told me she lived many past lives, reincarnated as a dragonfly, a guardian angel by her side. Pink roses pressed against cold glass, the cool edge of a birdbath. She left with a rattling breath, fading into the quiet of her next life.

(Draft 63, thanks Delilah🥀 for suggesting this one.) A girl walks on the city sidewalk. People of all ages and races and backgrounds pass her by. There’s so many people. She kicks away a plastic bottle, and rolls her eyes at the honking cars. Finally she makes it to the bus stop. She sits down and waits for the bus. There’s a song stuck in her head. One without a beat nor a melody. A simple tune. She isn’t aware of it, not consciously. But it’s always there. A presence in her life, looming over everything. Some call it a thought, an ideation, a nightmare. If she were asked, forced to acknowledge it, she would call it a song. Not pop nor rock nor hip hop. Not blues or jazz or folk. Not country, not alternative. Just, music. She wouldn’t be able to describe it better. Sometimes, it gets stuck in her head, and she can’t get it out with only her head. She knows a better way though. She can just wash it away. As easy as that. Until it builds up to that point, she ignores it. Why? Because if she acknowledges that it’s real, then suddenly, it is. (Thx for reading. Sry this is kinda short, I’ve been having trouble finding motivation to write.)

I’ve been hearing you, Dad. I know you are somewhere close. I just need to find you. I keep hearing a tune that you used to whistle every morning. I hear it in my dreams at night and even when I am in the pick up line at school. 🤔 It reminds me of the song you used to sing us right before sleep. Something about Cupid? It twas like, “Cupid, lend me your bow before a tantrum I throw.” 😁 OK… There’s no way those were the lyrics, but I was always extremely sleepy. It’s a really pretty melody. I just need to find out where it’s coming from.

‘Happy birthday to youu’ ChA cHa ChA Cheery voices sing happily Trying hopelessly to harmonize ‘Happy birthday to you’ cHa ChA cHa All eyes on me Me and my desperate attempt to be happy Happy birthday dear Camilah Happy birthday to you I force a smile and tell myself ‘It’s not there fault, they don’t know’ AnD mAnY mOoRe That one guy belts in the back I blow out my candles 12, 13…and 14 Fourteen candles, that’s all there’ll ever be (A/N: don’t really know what I was doing lol🥲but it’s my bday today…woo hoo 🫠)

The song never left me. You Spin Me Right Round, baby Right around, like a record baby. Round and round in my head it went, on a loop. Just the chorus. The rest of the song was lost to be burbles and murmurs. Right round baby right round…sometimes I would dunk my head under the water in the bathtub just to stop it. The chorus just would not let me alone, like a fever dream at night when I tried to sleep. I’d be about to drop off and suddenly it would pop into my head and round and round it would go. I’d bury my face in my pillow willing it to stop, but still it went. Right round baby, right round, like a record baby right round. Full circle. All the way around and back again. Starting from the beginning, spinning out of control. Like a record baby. I felt dizzy and then dizzier still. Right round, round round. And then again, back it came. I remembered what I had learned from X about the Samsaric wheel. You just can’t get off it. It’s like a merry go round that you can’t escape from. You want out but there’s no escape…you just keep going around making the same mistakes recreating the same

Swinging Up And Down The playground Is My Home. ‘So you’re still thinking of me, just like I know you should…’ I wonder if She’s Thinking Of me The air rushing Into my Face ‘I cannot give you everything, you know I wish I could.’ I imagine her eyes I want to give her Everything, She deserves it all. The swing comes up ‘I’m so high at the moment,’ Then down ‘I’m so caught up in this…” The way she smiles She’s perfect Wait no, she’s not actually, lemme explain You’re not gonna believe this, But the more flaws she has, The more perfect she is. The more special she is. ‘Yeah we’re just young,’ I remember meeting her At preschool ‘Dumb’ I remember laughing with her Singing so loud we could barely breathe In the car ‘And broke,’ I remember shopping with her At this candy store We wasted a ton of money For some chocolates. It was worth it. ‘But we still got love to give,’ I remember hugging her tightly I’m never going to let go again. I promised it that day. ‘While we’re young, dumb, young, young, dumb, and broke. Young dumb, young, young, dumb, and broke…’ The words fade away as I walk home, But one lyric Sticks out ‘Young, dumb, broke high school kids.’ That’s us.

A person who has a song stuck in their head constantly? … Huh. Oh, wait, that’s me.

There is no one who ever has done better At making me feel worse Now you really are the winner. There is nothing that ever could quite kill me more than what you did No you really are the winner Take a bow cause your the winner.

🎵mama🎵 👹mAmMy👹 🎵just killed a man🎵 👹Pew pew👹 🎵Put a gun against his head🎵 👹oH nOo👹 🎵pulled my trigger, now he’s dead🎵 👹bleurh👹

You don’t tell your heart to beat. You don’t need to think to blink. I don’t have to reach inside, these words - they just come out of me. My mind is a symphony, I think in a melody, I fail to hear the sound of me, But I still call it harmony. I swear I don’t write poetry, Most my pieces are like silent music. These words just sorta come to me, a muse I find truly amusing. Let’s speed this up. Dammit. Not again! “Babe! Have you seen my wrench?” “What!?!” “My wrench!!!” “Did you even look for it!?!” “Uh… Yeah!!!” “Check your pockets!!!” “Yeah? I got it!!!” Let’s overclock the metronome, I hope you’re ready. Here we go! Waking up all through the night, I try and try to keep it quiet, My mind won’t let me fall asleep, Unless I write the sounds it’s writing. I have music in my dreams. It’s a chorus of shrill screams. Tearing canvas at the seams. Maybe tell me what it means? Sonnet of my pain, you think? The notes have pushed me to the brink. These lyrics, to my soul, do sink. I’ll probably send this to my shrink. Perhaps he’ll see the missing link. Or send it back - just with a wink, ‘I think it’s just the sounds of ink.’ You don’t wanna read my writing - I swear it stinks.