i heard the marching come early, this year.

thousands of little feet tamping the earth

just above where i sleep.

they dance the same - their

joyous games played in the light of day.

where the call of 'trick or treat' is

so very loud i

can hear it from the dirt and weeds

because my home is the earth.

it is my house, and the bed where i sing

lullabies to the worms

coaxing them down onto my plate -

along with the turnips and potatoes and

everything that steeps in the dirt like a good tea.

Thanksgiving also came early this year.

i've gone and made my own feast.

but it's when the winter sinks

it's gnashing teeth into the ground

that i find my chains to be brittle.

binds of root and twig bloody my wrists

every day of the year -

but an early frost...what an omen indeed.

so early that Christmas might just see

more than just presents and fir trees.

oh, this year...it might just see me.

I know you're always there, as if you were a chunk of pure terror that had been chilling in space but had one day decided to dive down to Earth and had buried itself into my heart so that it became a part of it. Sometimes I feel like I could cut open my chest and cut it out and it, and all its heaviness would be gone and everything would be solved.

Sometimes it's fine, we're fine dude. I forget about it, I get distracted, and for once, I feel okay. But even though I feel as fearless as a lion, and on the top of the world, it pulls me back to the ground and I don't know who I am.

Sometimes, it takes control of me, melting down into a liquid and entering my veins, flowing through my body like water on a prayer wheel, powering it even more as it flies with my red blood cells. It makes me go crazy, and I feel as though I was going insane, and the world is bent and swirling around in ways I do not understand because it looks the same but it doesn't.

Sometimes I feel like it is the only thing that makes sense even though it casually drops a bucketful of irrationality into my mind and that doesn't make sense. But it's the only thing that's keeping me from going over the edge and I cling onto it until it becomes who I am. Which is terrifying to be honest. Yet, if I let it go, I'd crumble into dust as the rubber bands that had been holding me together the whole time snap.

The golden child,

The rule follower,

The role model.

Perfect grades,

Impeccable fashion,

Never a toe out of line.

But what if,

There’s more to life,

Than doing everything right.

A slip,

A mistake,

What if it’s a benefit?

What if perfection,

Or the goal of it,

Is a curse and not a blessing.

Change your career,

Say something stupid,

Toe the line.

Because only in failure do you learn,

Or so I’m told.

My brain won’t let me do it.

Maybe one day,

One day I’ll let lose,

Run free of the rules I’ve set for myself.

But not today,

Today I hide in my false perfection,

Aching to be someone else.

Why am I holding onto you, when I should let you go? Why am I afraid to let the real you show? She made me this way you know, (Mother), it was never me... I never had the chance to know you not at all, not since you were three. My dear friend, my only truth, my mirror, my honesty, can you see the real me? Of course not, but that's not true, I stand before you with a plain naked canvas, every morning! You are the witness to my before, my process and my perfection. Who am I without this exquisiteness? Who is beyond this reflection, if not the made-up make-up dressed in pretence?

It's you that has to go, you that draws me near, you that I pose to, that I sing to, that I smile falsely to - It is you dear mirror! I will hide you for a moment, into the background you shall fade... But I know I shall be back for you because where would I be, without the one constant in my life, who shelters me from my faults and sends me on my way out the door, looking flawless.