11.08.16

november 8th, 2016,

a night that will live on in infamy.

midnight closed its curtains on a day coated in crucified freedom,

dead by the hands of an america that stands 

for hatred that is tried and true,

for “it will always be us versus you.”

for “where can we do?”

they always said that blood was thicker than water.

watch my faithful eyes drown under

my tears as they follow a broken tomorrow 

where even hollow hopes could not save me from this shadow nation.

an anacrusis to an internal crisis,

i silently cried until my fifteenth birthday.

nine days, 

two hundred and sixteen hours, 

twelve-thousand nine-hundred and sixty minutes,

turning me into a witness to broadcasted unrest and deliberants,

fading the rose-colored lenses that accompany childhood innocence.

wishing on the birthday candles we could hardly afford,

my heart could no longer ignore that

the worst weapon against injustice is progressive silence.

so i wished upon intersectional feminism and human rights

upon love no matter our faults across these fault lines

because that bridge from child to adult

is when you realize that

growing up is the end of “i can when i’m older,”

and the beginning of “what can i do right now?”

america, your song of hopeless hypocrites

now breeds a home of persevering phoenixes,

and the traveling truth is

growing up is when you take your past ashes

and fuel them for the future.