Illustrated by Jasmine Ye
i can’t even remember the last time i saw the clouds,
but here they are, strangling the blue sky until it turns grey,
tightening their grip until not even the sun can peak through.
inside those bloated grey masses, ghosts lie waiting to haunt me again,
so close to being forgotten, but lurking back with the clouds just in time.
clouds of restless nights, suffocating pressure untucking my sheets,
conspiring to make me cold and brittle, because that’s easier to shatter.
clouds of doubt, wrapping my head in a fog of existential questions,
begging to be answered, and screaming when they’re not.
clouds of eyes—the biggest my own—narrow with detestation,
commanding me to either stand up straight and smile, or maybe just die.
so i lie in bed each night,
looking up at the glow-in-the-dark stars above my bed,
waiting for one to shoot across the ceiling so i can make a wish.
a wish back to the place where the sun always shone.
where its warm rays would wake me before my alarm did,
wrapping around me like a blanket as i threw back my own.
a wish back to the place where i could speak
without a microphone and people would listen.
a wish back to the place where i could laugh
without churning voices around me pointing out dwindling hourglasses,
telling me i “should be working on something productive right now.”
a wish back to the place where all eyes weren’t on me,
where i can trust someone without worrying they’d hurt me,
where i can be myself without seeing folds between their eyes.
and a wish back to them, the friends i left behind,
so i can see them in my presence, instead of only in my memories.
so i keep staring up at those star stickers above my bed,
watching them helplessly for hours every night, waiting.
waiting for one to take flight across the dark ceiling,
waiting to see the shining trail of stardust in its path,
waiting on a wish.
The Roar 