Nightly

She’s a bit hard to reach, and when you try to touch her your hand passes right through her skin.

She has eyes like half moons when she smiles, but no light shines from within.

Small whispers on the wind mutter laments into her ears; her face falls as she listens.

On the occasional cold night, the wind shakes her windows and the slightest glimmer sparks in her eye as the lower lid glistens.

Hope was something that her fingers wrapped around, but her grip was so tight it gushed out of her clenched knuckles.

Her mouth utters sharp jokes that make her flinch, and yet she still chuckles.

When the sun dips out of the horizon and she’s accompanied by her many sins she simply lays there, her body ready for the next numb bout of regret to persuade her. To pull her into the familiar grasp – misery of course, she values that.

Why would she not when happiness leaves her distraught and anxious?

Always alone, even in the thickest crowd she cries inside and begs for life to be the tiniest bit more gracious.

Who would want this? she whispers back to the wind, and they steal her words from her lips and cast them over the ocean.

“I can’t swim through that depth,” she says as everything sinks in the endless trench.

Lovers, as some call them, have never been fond of coldness on their skin. They crave warmth in a woman, but in her they find a chill that pesters them.

Why? Is such a sharp question; don’t mention all the scars on her skin.

While naked in the mirror, she touches herself and swears at them.

Cracks and scuffs and shards and shambles… sweep them under the rug or they’ll cut your feet. Traipse around in heavy boots and the soft skin will never have to bleed.

It’s almost time, she barely thinks as the final lights leave the dreary sky.

This is the time every day, every twenty-four hours I die.

I like this part, it makes it go away, all of the things that I don’t like.

And when I dream, I call it fake, and then continue on with my night.

That sleep is not a paradise; it’s a nightmare dressed up in a lucid dream.

“Do you really think you scare me, when you have no eyes with which to avert my gaze? When you hide around every corner, when you hide from the light of day?

“What is it you want? there’s nothing left. I’ve given up my body and my spirit is the frailest of lights. Keep the windows shut or the slightest draft will leave me in a pitch black night.

“I don’t like this world very much. I don’t want to be involved. If I bate my breath I won’t suffer and every problem will be solved.

“But I constantly think to myself; yes, today was not my best. But tomorrow tells me secrets; she says she’ll be better than the rest.

“If she’s lying, fuck her, time still goes on, I haven’t been beaten yet. But if she means it, and I trust her then I’ll have to do my best.

“Here are my last words for tonight, if I don’t cry out in my sleep… Dear life, I’m not afraid of death. I tend to die nightly.”

She crawls into her soft, cool bed and wills herself to sleep. She can’t remember what she dreams of but she’s better off without her dreams. Night passes, dusk then dawn, and somehow the heart still beats. It would be nice if you would love her, but it’s not something she’ll ever need.