The Places We've Been

the monsters linger. long after the story is over. 

the body. a fiction of flesh. the mind. a rot of protagonists. 

we try to bargain with change. but it never listens.

the strangle of choice. the bile of acceptance. 

we tumble through our lives. collecting all the fallen leaves. pretending. they're not dead. 

a triumph of marauders. at the apex of our grief.

everything that is lost. is everything that is gained.

the sour resonance of conceits poisoning every thought.

 we solve for how. but it's the why that betrays.