Your Stained Palm

You look grounded here, with the stars bursting in your eyes and the grass tickling your face and the streetlight illuminating the smile on yourlips as you look at me. You look happy, too happy, like there’s nothing more you want to do than lie here with me, with the lie that I am.

I wish I could feel as grounded as you. I thought you would be enough to make me whole, to make me feel like I have something to live for. But when I sneak secret glances at you, at the stars in your eyes and the grass in your face and the smile on your lips, my heart doesn’t skip a beat and my breath doesn’t hitch and your presence makes me feel

Your fingers whisper against my hand, asking if you can hold it, if you can hold me, and I let you, even though I know that you’re only cradling my hollow shell. Do you feel the Emptiness in my palm? Do you feel the static in my fingers? Do you feel the lies on my skin?

You close your eyes. I can’t tell what you feel. My empty hand grips yours, and for a second - a blissful, heavenly second - I can almost believe I fit in it. But my essence is too unstable to be solid, too insubstantial to be held, and within seconds I’m leaking through the cracks between your fingers and leaving the stain of my soul in your

You aren’t enough to keep me here. I was hoping