Isolated Solidarity 

Silence doesn’t only live in the nighttime. Silence

lives inside these walls, hollowing out my soul and emanating from me everywhere I go. Over the years I’ve learned that the only way to survive is to absorb it all inside your flesh, let it diffuse into your bones and dissolve into your soul. The neutron-star that is my barely-holding-on heart attracts all the horrors of the night. 

I have never had another soul to rely on, and my heart

has only ever known the stabbing knives of hatred. I have learned my body is my only friend. 

I have hands that have never been held. Hands that

are ready to beat the brains out of anyone who startles my corroding heart. 

My legs are an amalgam of cells that become muscles

that support my two feet and two calves and two thighs. They all work in asynchronous harmony to save me from the screams and the lies and the fists of the horrific monsters; the pain that these things induce in me has been the only consistency in my life. My legs send me leaping into the air, willing to carry me beyond the boundaries of space-time to keep me safe. They guide me towards the quiet corners of the forests where desperation awaits a companion.

Desperation and I know each other well. Our bond

isn’t perfect, but we’ve known each other since shortly after my infancy. 

I have ears that know whether they hear earth-

shattering screams or moribund silence, an eternal state of adrenaline and godlike alertness is the only thing that can save me from the monster inside these walls anymore. 

I have eyes that don’t know how to stay still, following everything they know how to; even the negligible movements of every particle in all the crevices and cracks of this earth. My eyes and ears are inextricably linked, aiding my legs in their knowledge of where to go next 

Together they are a powerful force, supporting each other with a love that my skin and heart and soul have never known. 

I have a body covered in cracks and mutilated skin. I

carry with me the marks from razor-edged rocks and near-invisible glass shards hidden amongst all the river banks and ominous forests and midnight alleyways I’ve tried to hide in over the years. Their secrets are entangled with my DNA. I will never escape my roots no matter how far I run. Still, my skin is a heroine, taking all the pain and bearing the scars to save the rest of me from ever having to doubt my ability to save myself. It knows it will never let the heinous litter scattered on the very streets which facilitate my freedom dare to prevent my escape. 

My brain is a god, omniscient in the only universe it

knows, the deity my body worships. Bones are countries, muscles are states, cells are law-abiding citizens that will fight to the death. It knows every stabbing cut that my skin sacrifices itself to bear must be catalyzed into a fighting power. It knows that despair is a disease and that I must force myself to traverse another infinity before I’ll even consider giving in. 

I don’t know what to make of this mess inside me,

though I am certain that I owe it my life. With every aching moment, every time pain reverberates throughout my soul, invigorating me with a kind of dejected ecstasy, my body fights on. My body is an eternally terrorized contortion of the screams and the lies and the fear of my childhood. My cells explode at the premise of love - what even is connection with another human? 

My soul is how they should teach kids about

Zeno’s paradox. It is inching closer to collapse, so impossibly dense, so ready to destroy the world I know and become a human black hole, an entity ravenous for all the goodness out there. I fear that if I lose myself to the misery, 

my soul will only be satiated when a lacerated world which only knows feigned smiles and forced laughter remains. 

I never know if this terror has an end date. I pray and I beg but it presses on, particles of horror weaseling their way into the air that I breathe, leaving foul tastes on my tongue and reminding me that freedom really is an eternity away, that my legs truly might have to carry me on forever. 

Every day I am mesmerized by the ability of this resilient thing which I’ve inhabited throughout all of my most trying times. I live here, and I am eternally inspired by the tenacity of my home. And as my heart grows colder and heavier and hollows out, I know I owe it to my body to do the one thing I can. I know I owe it to my body to retain hope. 

Hope burns eternal in the chasm of my chest,

animating my desolate heart and pushing all the hurt and fear far enough away that I keep breathing. Hope is what assures me I’ll never fall into an abyssal void of no return. Hope is why somewhere inside my eyes, a faint light radiates through the murkiness. Hope is my oxygen. It fuels my life, one inhale and one exhale at a time. 

My body has been beaten and broken and tested and

tried, but I am never beyond repair. I will always find a way to pick up the pieces of my scarred soul, and hope is what holds my hand. Even if no other soul is with me in this fight right now, hope, my body, my brain, and I, we all stand together in isolated solidarity.