Middle of the Night

by makenzie peterson

1. I’m too tired to write. Please don’t yank me from that world again. Don’t find my loose ends. Don’t you know not to pull at threads? Let me trail off of the garment of my own life. Let me weave myself further and further out. I know it’s hard there too but at least I don’t have to make decisions. At least when I feel something I won’t question it raw.

Give me sewer’s tape like a band aid. Maybe now is the time to spin out of the thing I was. A new dress altogether.

I know it’s all rough baby. I know it’s hot to the touch. Sometimes you like it and sometimes it burns.

2. Maybe I’ll catch you next sunrise, happiness. I haven’t been as diligent as I used to be, standing out in wait for you.

But I am coming to respect myself more than this! You have to want me back if this will ever work. I can’t keep chasing and pining for you, it looks pathetic. It’s not long before I get over you, happiness. I’m getting stronger now, I’m close to turning my back on you for the last time. I can feel it.

3. Wood grain can become a haven, a beautiful and intricate solitude from the world.

I could stare into wood grain for the rest of my life, it could keep me from the rest.

4. The birds are outside my window or I have them in my hands and I sit at the window. The birds screech and clatter until I knock my papers off the bed and struggle at the sill. I run outside and watch them all burst from the tree like the plague and it’s so loud.

5. Please don’t put any more of your truths in my pockets. I always fill them with heavy things and when they break, it takes me months to get out of bed and mend them. Anyways, I lost all of my needles and you knew that.