i forge, in fiction, asylum.

i remake the world in pencil strokes

and keyboard clicks, rejoicing in the proud march

across the page of stories i fear saying aloud.

but sometimes even the written word can fail me;

some emotions are strong enough to tear asylum apart.

 

i build feelings into heavy paragraphs that crumble apart

and so my fears trample unhindered through asylum.

my emotions flow in unpredictable tides. they drown me.

my failures to buffer them are punishing strokes

Like those of a father’s slipper against skin. i don’t cry aloud.

i just hope to regain the ease with which i made words march.

 

time bleeds into a new year: january, february, march...

new semester, new classes, new faces, but i hold myself apart.

there’s no backspace when you talk. if asked, i say aloud

“i’m fine, just quiet.” i say inside, “where is asylum?”

i paint my problems with broad strokes.

i rage against my inadequacies. i find no peace in being me.

 

one day for class, i write poems. there’s a shift in me.

i can’t quite recall the last time i witnessed a march

that flowed so easily from heart into pen strokes.

it’s not all easy: some lines still fall apart

but i knit them together, tight like gates to asylum

where fear falters. i read the stanzas aloud.

 

there’s an ebb and flow to stanzas recited aloud

and the effort needed to capture it enraptures me.

writing poetry causes me to reconsider what is asylum:

paragraphs of desires and musings brought to life. the march

of emotion leashed in verse across the page blows apart

my preconception that control can’t be found in lesser strokes.

 

poetry forces me to restrain the number of pen strokes

in which i express my depths. it’s easier to say aloud

when i must consider every syllable, and set apart

what jumbles the message, the pieces of me

that are the hardest to convey. and while the march

of words is shorter than ever, i continue to reach asylum.

 

i still paint my problems in vague strokes, but inside me

it gets easier to breath, and sometimes i say aloud the march

of feelings that threaten to tear me apart, and i forge, in verse, asylum.