you will never read this.

You will never read this.

You will never read this,

or see this,

or smell this,

or run your underage hands along this.

You will never hear this from me.

You'll catch wind of my mistakes,

my name will change color in your mind,

while you seek safer hands to occupy yours.

You will hear about me from other mouths.

Tongues will break and heads will roll

and

you will never hear this from me.

But you'll hear me from other mouths,

where people hold mistakes high 

and successes don't make for conversation

like tragedies do.

You'll hear me from other mouths,

where they paint me like a Pollock and hate me like a Warhol,

where they'll tell stories of the mess I made and the people who passed,

because my problems were louder than my laughter.

You will never read this.

But in case you do,

I died every hour of three years.

I died between every street and sentence,

taking more prayers than breaths,

where I was broken from my knees down,

against the bedroom door.

Like filling your lungs with sand,

and slamming your heart against the wall,

over and

over and

over.

It hurt like hell,

but God breathed for me.

Mercy never clocked out.

I died between batting eyes and bad dates,

I cried between classes and cut after hours,

I cracked my knuckles until they broke,

I cracked them for you

and you and me and

me and you and me

and us

and her

and him.

I died and died again.

I died until it didn't hurt.

But God breathed for me,

and mercy never clocked out.

Mercy never clocked out.

Mercy kept me up at night.

Mercy held my hair up as I bled out on the bedroom floor,

Mercy held my heart up as I washed the red out of the carpet.

Mercy never clocked out,

and God never left.

Maybe my eyes are too wrong to see into.

Maybe I'm too off to deserve good.

And maybe you'll grab me by the coattails of my mistakes,

strangle that in your head,

wash me out of your mind forever.

But the pain never clocked out,

so I'll never clock out.

For three years.

But God will never leave me.

And you will never read this.