I am unequivocably and unapologetically me.
I tried for far too long to blend in to the shadows,
avoiding the looks from those around me,
and biting my tongue until it bled,
rather than say what I think
​and be who I am.
​I'm done with that.

I'll admit
sometimes my sense of rythm is negligible,
but I will wholeheartedly say that I dance to the beat of my own drum.

Actually, scratch that.
I stumble, trot, leap, sprint and run amok
to the sound of my own goddamned orchestra!
You might hear a dischordant and chaotic racket,
but it's as reckless and proud as the heart racing inside my chest.
and as unabashedly ridiculous as the thoughts in my head.
It's a masterpiece.
And it's mine.

White lines score your arms,
memories carved from
success and struggle.

Simple sounds in a rhythm, coursing
through my veins. Keeping my heartbeat
going strong, my feet tapping
the ground in time. Hearing
it takes away my
worry and pain.
Music makes
my soul
​dance.

At first, your senses are just in shock,
as you're caught between a pulsing bass,
flashing lights,
and bodies shifting around you.

There's too much for you to take in,
so you simply stand there,
stunned and sticking to your friends' sides,
trying to ignore the elbows of those walking by.

Eventually, you may start being able to experience more.
Interesting people stand out to you,
or the songs are recognizable again,
and you can enjoy swaying or jumping in rhythm.

Either that, or every loud noise,
nearby sudden movement,
or environmental change,
jerks you back into the present again,
where the music's too loud,
and the crowd's dense enough to squeeze your lungs,
making air difficult to draw in.

Your heart starts pumping,
and you need some air
that hasn't been exhaled by a hundred others.
Space to move and shift
where you won't bump into half a dozen people at once.
Where the night is cooler
than a struggling air conditioner can compensate for.

Shhhh.... listen.
What do you hear in the white noise around you?

In the dead air between your breaths
as you float from wakefulness to peaceful sleep.
When your eyes are resting in darkness,
and your mind drifts from thought to thought
as it reaches for dreams just out of reach.
But your ears still scout the silence for anything worth noticing.
The air sounds stale in the night,
compared to when the sun shines high above you.
Like the darkness has smothered the life from the earth around you.
A thick pillow clenched in unseen hands,
pressed tightly against a helpless face,
until the struggling ends.

The creak of the house is enough to yank you away from unconsciousness.
If silence is the enemy tonight,
then maybe music will vanquish it?
Earbuds are gently pressed into place,
and you settle down again,
hoping to find peace this time around.

It seems to work,
as your heartbeat begins to slow,
and your lungs move gently within your ribs,
a counter-rhythm to the music you hear.

But within the static between songs,
little blips and shrieks lay just beyond your understanding.
Voices pleading and begging
where no one can hear,
in an airless binary vacuum.
Ghosts in the machine call for you,
the unwilling listener,
to send help,
to look out,
to do anything other than just sit and listen.

Then the next song begins,
drowning out the other voices.
And finally, your mind lets you rest.
You fall into a deep dark pool of obliviousness to the outside world.

The ghosts are gone.
The creaks are gone.
And soon, you'll be gone too.
Because now,
your ears will no longer be able to hear
the nearly silent padding of feet outside your door,
or the creak of it opening,
or your breaths as they're stopped.

The click of fingers meeting keys,
or the scritching of pens against paper,
is a melody to me.
A lullaby that calms my racing mind,
and takes me away from my anxieties,
even if just for a moment.

I can dwell within the mind of someone else for a change,
watch them struggle with apocalypse level crises,
or the slaying of monsters that could eat me with one bite.

It makes me see the events of my life through a different lens.
If someone could do such heroic deeds,
and change the world through magic or wit,
then it means that I can get through my day, too.
And maybe even my week,
if I just look for the glimpses of fantasy that this world was to offer.

I love seeing what people can create.
Whether it be from paints or pencils,
sentences or sounds.

To look at an emptiness in the world,
and use something from deep inside yourself to fill it,
takes indescribable amounts of time and effort.

The amount of water droplets in a rainstorm,
but blood and sweat.
A mob's worth of creased brows and empty coffee cups.

You can't really put a price tag on creation.

Sometimes on a hot day,
the breeze
with gentle touches,
soothes the sweat from my skin,
playing with the loose strands of hair around my face,
making them dance to an unknown tune,
as leaves join them,
tumbling down from tired branches in a rustling chorus,
and skimming into drifts at my feet.

The subtle clicking
of keys beneath my fingers.
Simple harmonies.

Does anyone else ever look at the scrawling text in front of them
and wonder how our eyes process all of those little lines and circles,
making them into music
and stories?
Scratches darkening the pastey background,
imparting knowledge and opinion alike.

I look at them, and wonder how we all make sense of them.
When did nonsensical scribbles
morph into familiar ways of expression?
Who decided that a T should be two lines,
instead of three?
Or that b should be a backwards d that's lost its tail?

These are the kinds of things I wonder about.
That, and why my handwriting is so messy.
It's probably just the tremors.
And trying to write while on a moving bus probably doesn't help too much.