Queen Fondue's Space Castle

I can’t focus. Leaping from thing to thing Looking for solid ground Desperate for something to hold me down To keep me from floating off the surface of this earth Into the crushing void of space. Sick to my stomach Paralyzed The world is crashing in around me And I can’t convince myself To put down my phone. The world is crashing in around me And I get get the voices in my head To shut the fuck up For five fucking minutes.  

For a long time I've turned music into work. A list of albums, A list of songs, A list of bands. A to-do list. Always expanding. Always looming. I watched as the entire catalog of streaming pulled further and further away from me Miles stretching between us As I chased after it. As I chased the high Of obsessive Fiery Passion For every song I saw on the horizon. Then one day I wiped it clean. Burned the list. I bought a CD. A little disc of passionately crafted art Small enough to fit in my pocket—though I wouldn't want to scratch it.  Suddenly, the music was right there in my paws. I could touch it. There was no chase. The music wasn't a looming beast. It was there, in my paws. One album. A selection of songs, and then it ended. I was free, in that moment.

I miss you.  Once you were warm and close And your voice was a soft embrace A home I could go back to When the world got too cold. But recently it seems more and more Like the house is a ghost. Nails have gone missing That once bound floor and wall together. Nooks that used to be hidden away In the corners of big, open rooms Have been filled in with concrete. If I leave the house for too long To gather with friends I always worry That when I return All the doors Will be locked. And I'll beg and scream Let me in. I'll have to search for an open window Maybe even climb in Through the second story Just to get inside Away From the cold. One day there won't be an open window. You'll fill the whole house With cement And it too Will lose its warmth. Please unlock the door. I'm scared.

Maybe I'll take it all back All the work I've done To find myself. It might be stolen from me, anyway In a single moment A trigger pull And my life is taken By a stranger who thinks They know me better than me And has decided That my life must end. Maybe I'll go back to pretending That I'm one of them Out of fear They'll kill me if I'm not I don't want to be brave anymore. I just want to be left alone.

It hurts the worst when I can see how much she loves me But can't feel it Because even in her warm embrace I'm still cold

It's easier to look like you're giving it all When you have the world. Just one percent of what you have And that's all it takes But when it's all gone You can give everything you have and more And still it won't be enough.

When I heard you had cancer I felt nothing. What was I supposed to feel? Grief? How was I supposed to grieve you when I wasn’t really losing anything? For all my life you’ve made me feel lesser than you. You put me into this world, and you could take me out. My feelings never mattered to you. Maybe I taught myself they shouldn’t matter to me, then. I taught myself to feel nothing but apathy for you. When I heard you had cancer I felt nothing. Why am I sobbing when I think about you? I want to cling to you. I want you to love me. I want you to hold me. I want you to make me feel safe Wanted Like I’m good enough for you. I want to be good enough for everyone, really. I create I give I refuse to take Hoping and praying That I’m good enough To deserve the love Of those closest to me. That’s what you gave me. What a thoughtful gift. Maybe I do love you Or maybe I’m grieving the possibility that I ever could.

I’ve seen a lot of pottery videos. Shorts of people making clay sculptures. Shaping them, molding them as they spin. Pouring them into molds they found on the internet Just to see What comes out. It’s nice, sometimes, to watch someone create. I don’t make pottery. But I find myself with my own molds Confines much larger than me That I compulsively try to fill. When clay dries in its mold, it sets. It is ready to be dipped in a glaze To be fired in a kiln And to come out sparkling. Shining with a fresh, remarkable beauty that it didn’t quite have before. A deeper intensity. A glowing image. Shined to perfection by the process. But when I dry in my mold… I yearn to reshape myself. The glaze washes over me A dreary fog, a disorienting coat. It consumes me in my entirety Just in time for the kiln to scar my skin. When will I sparkle?

I can’t be here anymore. I long for it. I stretch myself to be with you. I strain my tired soul Wearing it thin So that you might pull upon it more. And when I try to take it back To snap it back into place To its natural shape You never seem to follow. Perhaps it is inherent, then That to be with you I must be elastic.  

I don't know when the last time I existed was I watch her suffer and hide from her feelings And I can't reach her to help because I'm drowning beneath them Sometimes I don't see the surface for months Because there's an ocean of tears she hasn't cried One I can't wade through Today she cried For a really long time And now I'm here again  I can breathe I can speak I can love I can be

It's the quiet mornings Before anyone else has woken When the sun is barely on the horizon The hum of the computer Before my friends are up No notifications to follow To bombard my brain with The space to wake up In solitude Yogurt and bacon A glass of juice Gentle music And time to think

I’m always running. For years, I’ve been running. Running to comfort. Running to intimacy. Running to sex. To work. To film. To music. Animation. Books. Anime. Running to any distraction I can think of. Hoping the distraction will provide me shelter. But when each distraction becomes a cage With walls and ceiling crumbling Which they all inevitably do I run again. I never stop running. When was the last time I had a glass of water? My legs are burning. Sometimes I’m not even sure they’re still there anymore.

I spend so much time running away All of my energy What little I have Invested in escaping it The despair The depression The exhaustion I don’t want to be with it. I want to leave it behind An abusive ex A neglectful parent Never to be seen again. But maybe all that running exhausts me more Seeking arms to lie in Fingers to brush away the sadness I convince myself that the tingles of pleasure Will melt away the sadness But it always creeps back in Long enough for the pleasure To become exhausting, too. Maybe it doesn’t hate me. Maybe it’s scared, too. Maybe it needs me. Maybe tonight I just need To exist in healthy misery.

I know the fear is there The despair I’m scared to put my paws through the bars To pet the lonely creature I’ve been told That it bites

Trans people never seem to get it when they're given gifts. We have a hard time accepting them. Maybe it's because  It seems strange to us That nice things would happen With no strings attached

I don't know anymore. My bed is a neodymium magnet and my back is made of steel. A pull so strong I could never hope to resist it. Can I crawl out? I don't know anymore. It's the only comfort I have left, grasping for meaning grasping for ground grasping for cover It's not safe out there for me. They want me dead. They want to gun me down in the streets. Not my bed, though. It welcomes me. Despair welcomes me. Isolation welcomes me. I embrace it. What other place will have me? I don't know anymore. The thick, cool comforters smother my flame Or what little of it still burns But outside is a hurricane A tsunami Can I protect myself from drowning in it? I don't know anymore. What even made my flame burn Back when it still did? I thought I knew The source of its heat The fuel that made it spark and roar But these days it feels more and more like I don't know any more