everything numbs

to be honest
the fire in my fingertips is getting harder to find

and days go by without me remembering
that i am alive.
perhaps it's age and perhaps it isn't

either way,
it's all going numb.
i want to have the idealism i did at 18,
the self confidence, the joy too large
for me to contain. to be honest,
i want to feel the same kind of heartbreak
i did at 14. it blew me up, blossomed like
wild roses and firecrackers, left me weeping
and so alive. nothing feels that way
anymore. nothing hurts too much to bear;

except this itself, this numbness, this
sense of falling, this city of ruins
that was once gloriously my own.

perhaps it's age. perhaps time.
like metal rusts, perhaps i rust too.
everything numbs. nothing feels like
life. only like clockwork. the colours
dim, like in the movies, and stay there.

i will go on because that is the only way
and nobody asked me when they decided.
perhaps it's inevitable, that the tremble in my belly
would die down and leave only ashes, only damp pillows.
too many people have said too much and for the first time
i have nothing to say. nothing to hear. only a little ache

for birdsong, and the sound of wind rushing through trees,
and the sound of my heart billowing out into the sky and
calling out to airplanes, to broken hearts, to forgotten books.
i am an airplane. a broken heart
forgetting itself. a forgotten book.
nothing is calling out to me. i hide.
these words mean nothing. there is only

a slow squandering of time. only scrolling.
only smoking. only music that lets you forget.
only sad news. only more books. only a future
that asks you to care. only a roomful of people
who love you. only so many notebooks you filled
and forgot. only words. only void. only falling.