i want to quit

shouldn’t you throw in the towel if you know you’re potentially going to lose everything?

death has called me for a decade now

sixteen

nineteen

twenty-one

twenty-three

twenty-five

twenty-six

it’s getting shorter now

and there is no one who can save me

i’ve tried myself

and been successful

until now

i’m used to big waves

but no one can survive a tsunami

(god, i sound so dramatic. so self-centered.)

(but when i turn my attention outward, i see flames. hear children screaming. feel my mother and father in pain. taste the residue leftover from tear gas. could i help? god, i wish. maybe, if i could fucking get out of bed. if i could stand for more than five minutes. if i could be a god damn adult.)

at least before i could hide it.

i was weird, quirky, but not a burden.

now people are finding out.

finding out.

i’m getting too old for the sympathy earned by childish innocence.

pity is all that’s left for me.

for the first time,

i don’t know if i’ll be okay.