Sola ellipsis

The gentle and rhythmic hum of the train soothed Aurora into a dull lull. As she peered through the carriage window, with one eye open- a picturesque field of grass spanning as far as the eye can see steadily came into view. What a beautiful and vast kind of nothingness she thought to herself. While others would have seen this and raveled in the beauty of nature and life. She instead saw the endlessness that is an affliction on all living things. We live, we die so others can live and die. The pointlessness of it all. Caught off-guard by the often absentminded straying of her thoughts, she shook her head violently to her left as if to wake herself from that dark place she knew all too well. Looking down at hands that were cradling shaky knees, she pulled up the right sleeve of a worn-out winter sweater. The grey stitches were starting to venture out and free loose thread that swayed along to the beat of the train. Aurora took one long breath in, closed her eyes altogether and mastere

A decade worth of prose and poetry Writing us into pieces we author for our compilation Word never subject to interpretation -           we are who we are Where you begin is where I end In the same orbit we circle infinitely Minding the same garden of thought -           you know what I’m about to say before I say it Starting raging fires, we soothe the burn with whispered sweet nothings You take my hand, and worlds collide A coven of the blind leading the blind We stride in unapologetically Do you not know what you do to me? You bury yourself inside my body -           each time dying a million tiny deaths In the aftermath you quake and shake I give in and let myself go The most painful kind of pleasure, victim to all the feelings we can’t help but let show You demand to know if he could ever take me in like you do -           in my entirety I shudder The depths of a most virile possessiveness -           a place I both fear and with bated

Infinite curiosity and wonder Holding up a woolen crown Weaved with a thread of certainty Kissing both the heavens and the earth Nestling the subtle nectar of unconditional love Tentatively peering past the constraints re-imagined by men The dirt and the musk veiled by bright lights Passively they walk past monuments and metaphors Little to no regard for the rotten underbelly The stench of hopes lost, dreams discarded -           And complacency accepted as a norm Ill fitted realities we slide into Like slick robes we put them on Forsaking a most sacred calling While we abide a most trivial and misguided mental oppression Somehow convinced that this is the best we can offer Prison or a coffin… Dying before we are dead- a routine we practice too often The shoes we cannot fill are too grand A history we cannot placate Because what we are is the change they died for Unsatisfied, but we remain asking for more Complete and unburdened

Blood stains on the pavement The footprints of an extinguishing life force Squalor, death and rust They care not for us Gunshots, disembodied screams And the ever-present swan song of police sirens Little kids play on concrete streets No place to house innocence when home possesses no safety, Nor does it offer security In the men we can never trust, devoid of wisdom and humility     Masculinity as fragile as a wine glass We once wore deviance as the voice of the silenced Now we neatly tuck it away together with all the agency of our womanhood We weave street lights like moths to flame My brothers forget us My sisters allow it And the children cannot help but witness it They placate our existence with the amnesia we find at the bottom of a bottle They wait like vultures They poison us with unsolicited prescriptions, When only they carry the sickness Young boys raise hands and fists For a cause rooted only in violence We