Words pour meaninglessly. Arbitrary
and seamless. Filtered yet pervasive.

Sentences erupt but don't hold
significance. Attached yet disembodied.

Speech cascades unwillingly. An alien
speaker. Detached. No metaphor.

Humility and gentleness
Are often mistaken for weakness
Selfish and ignorant minds
Just cannot understand tenderness

Why do I feel so alone
When I am in crowds
Why am I so quiet
When others are around
Every truth I wish to say
Gets stuck inside my chest
Each and every single day
I just want eternal rest

cool breeze on skin
refreshing breathing-in

air from across the sea
full of salt and fish-

singing Whales
-tales of the deep.

Our caps flew like confetti.
Thank god I customized mine.
I'll keep it as a memento of all-nighters,
friendships formed in the academic trenches,
dismissive professors and group-project-tortures.

This isn’t another ‘drunk girl’ holiday, despite obvious similarities.
Our parents, sisters, brothers, and grandmothers are here.

We came in doe-eyed, holding overpriced planners,
and enough provisions for two year Mars missions.
We hoped to discover friends, decent Wi-Fi signals
and perhaps our adult selves.

Now we're holding diplomas, those future-proofing talismans.
Mine’s in molecular biophysics and biochemistry.
Which is wry, because when I was in high school,
my sister accused me of not knowing how to boil water.

I've been asked "What’s next?" a thousand times in the last month.
I have plans—but I was dying to shrug and say, “that’s tomorrow’s problem,” like I’ve spent major duckets, degree wise, but remain the ditzy blonde.
The standard graduate answer, I’ve heard, is "I dunno."
(though honestly, it’s a great answer).

Congratulations, all of you graduating overachievers out there—everywhere.
Go forth, be fabulous and find that next big dream.
Can you believe we actually did this?
Argh! I gotta go, someone wants another picture.
.
.
Songs for this:
What Dreams Are Made Of by Evann McIntosh
Summer Wind by Robert Mosci
Tomorrow by Wings

~
Lipstick to void. She is a race against time. The beveled past a disruption in her lines of influence.

Travel is dangerous, and tonight it darkens the highway of blood vessels coursing through her extremities. She wants to be luminous and under the skin.

While Dorothy dreams of tornadoes in Kansas, she dreams of remote climbs in lesser Glasgow, of party drugs in Tokyo. How many lights does she see?

In her hair are sixty circuits. But she waits, religiously inclined on the hotel bed. She drove through ghosts to get here wearing nothing but Las Vegas.

So strange at this hour, in a city full of sleepwalkers for the taking, she now dreams she's a bulldozer, she now dreams she's alone in an empty field.
~

to my summer breeze
heavy rain and quiet night —
lie down next to me