A poem by Sofia Sears

The girl who loses time in between counting each breath

and breaking apart bread to celebrate bones untorn and skin still with heat

The world that curses her existence with its ignorance and melodic indifference towards it

which crumples soft wishes into pale love-notes addressed to the universe stained with paper-cut fingertips

The headache that lingers through shaken nights that turn stale with sickening symmetry

those patterns of lifeless indulgence in passivity that turn her ambitions to dust

The man who looks too long at the quiet curve of her neck and bends her body backwards

and snaps her in half with the upwards eyebrow-smirk-and holler winning combo

The child that tugs at her sweater to point out the blisters on her swollen ankles and cries

in disgust at the scarlet mess in her pants because she’s supposed to lose faith in her body

The pill bottle stacked between malicious and empty wine glasses and heartwarming coffee cups

that she swallows in too-bright mornings with tasteless water to drown herself out

The pencil she digs into hairband-hugged wrists and carves into sore knuckles to feel out

loose joints and knead herself bloody

The kiss she steals from the sunlit porch from the neighboring cat that watches all hell

in her small, violet bruises and entertains her loose smiles through the first-floor window that she

flashes in between cuts.