TheAwkwardWriter805

The first Was my taste of what love could be Bitter like wine I got drunk off the attention Step by step I danced through your hallways Avoiding the red flags That I mistook for rose petals Blinded by passion That reached out to caress my cheek You looked into my eyes And only saw a meal Devoured and broken You took my ability To say no And I stayed Even though I was by your side You continued down the sidewalk Keeping me in The middle of the road Letting me suffer Until I decided to let go And deviate Onto my own path.

Feeling like a ghost As I go through the motions Of the smiles and confidence That drag around my corpse Validation propping me up for more As the tears roll down my face I tell myself I can't do this anymore My legs popping in agreement But my mind tells me no Because Over time The flowers I had accumulated Will wither away Or find themselves Over watered With the waves Of want and misunderstandings As they always do

With those times That I climbed that mountain I remember looking at the skies Seeing how brightly The moon and stars shone Ignoring the raging blizzards Screaming out Regrets and doubts. Reaching up I gripped a star Tighter and tighter Until I realized A galaxy Of blues and purples Decorated my own throat As I let go A blinding light Burned my hands As I fell back down Crashing into the unforgiving mass of Earth As it pulled me Back into the darkness For one final sleep My mind desperate For another chance to live. Clawing my way out I began my descent My legs screaming To run Faster and faster Descending down the narrow paths Threatening to collapse The raging blizzards continued on Reaching the bottom Their howls of desperation Became quieter and quieter Until silence was all I heard Continuing from the mountain I started to see the sun Greeting me in the distance Feeling for the first time in awhile Its arms wrap around my body Giving me life to carry on Never turning back To that

My mind races From one place to another With every destination I'm met with a steel cage And no place to call home With my heart sobbing Into the arms of desperation Time turned away From my cries And as it kept moving My mind eventually slowed down Accepting its fate Succumbing to a familiar darkness Leaving my body In pieces That others forced Shaped it into their own ideals Disappointment in their eyes As they continued to remold My reflection was left unrecognizable My mind shattered beyond repair As the shadows left Their egos trailed behind Leaving me alone With the final thread cut From my perception of reality As I found myself Trapped in an endless cycle Of anguish Screaming into nothingness Left alone with my thoughts Pondering Of how could I rebuild When I couldn't remember Who I was before?

Tamed by the masses as they stare A veil of guilt grips our throats As I stoke the embers Of our freedoms. Because my inaction To do as they say Brings up a reaction From my very existence as a woman Vulva, Vagina Our own gardens stripped from the land We created Its name censored Sliced by the book Created by men and their destruction Its title named "Patriarchy" From the famous series: Misogyny As we fight to keep these flames alive Every wave burns through Each version they bring We will continue to build our gardens And let them flourish with every generation Allowing ourselves to enjoy life With every inaction becoming a statement That we won't let them dictate who we are Because we are women And we won't let you Diminish our flames

Like an apparition in the wind I'm carried away in the currents By the pressures of my sin Floating I reflect The riptides continue to pull me in The hurt The pain The validation of others Acting like a life jacket That's been torn by the storm Some waves are stronger than others As they pull me in They topple over And push me under Holding me down There is no escape As I begin to drown And as I swim to the surface To save myself I flail Realizing that I don't know how to swim How do I escape? How do I save myself? When I've been using life jackets Covered in masking tape When I've been staring in my reflection That glares in defiance At what I've become From what I can't escape A person who can't swim Sinking into the depths I am left to my fate