[  ] i am Diane Nguyen
[  ] when the lights are off and the room's too quiet.
[  ] when i start spiraling over nothing,
[  ] but pretend i’m just tired.
[  ] when i swallow the urge to say, “i’m not okay,”
[  ] because i don’t want to ruin the vibe.
[  ] i get her.
[  ] she writes things she’ll never publish
[  ] and calls it healing.
[  ] me too.

[  ] i am Flame Princess.
[  ] masking my heat with forced politeness,
[  ] but the fire kicks at the cracks in my voice.
[  ] i was taught too young that my feelings were too much
[  ] so i bottled them.
[  ] and when the bottle breaks,
[  ] i’m the villain.
[  ] one day you’ll get it
[  ] that’s never who i was.
[  ] i’m just a girl who’s overstimulated,
[  ] trying not to combust.
[  ] trying to regulate in an unadjusted world.


[  ] i am Kirk Gleason,
[  ] Full of chaotic side character energy.
[  ] i tell stories with weirdly specific details
[  ] so no one notices i’m actually unraveling.
[  ] being silly is easier than being seen.
[  ] i make people laugh so noone ever stops to ask
[  ] The dreaded "are you okay"
[  ] I make people laugh because if they’re laughing,
[  ] they’ll stay.

[  ] I am Jake the Dog,
[  ] soft and simple.
[  ] i love hard and think deep.
[  ] i hold onto weird metaphors
[  ] about cups and pillow forts
[  ] I tell myself not to get hung up on imaginary things
[  ] because that’s how i understand the world.
[  ] i just wanna chill,
[  ] but my brain won’t always let me.
[  ] yet still I try, cause to love life you need problems
[  ] And i am determined to live to my to its fullest

[  ] i am Ted Mosby,
[  ] annoyingly romantic.
[  ] the kind who falls in love in soft, slow ways
[ ] not with only with grand gestures, but with quiet familiarity.
[  ] The type to romanticise shared eyecontact and exchanged looks
[  ] i write poems about people
[  ] who don’t know they broke my heart.
[  ] Though i still think love is worth the mess
[  ] Even when i doubt myself i always know
[  ] Loving someone is never a waste

[  ] and i’m Periwinkle.
[  ] the soft, sparkly part of me i locked in a box
[  ] when life got loud.
[  ] When life didn't understand I was only a child
[  ] i still believe in her.
[  ] i still believes she's there.
[  ] The little kid, with not so little dreams
[  ] she danced in the frost and thought the world was kind.
[  ] she’s quiet now,
[  ] Her sparkle not so bright
[  ] but she’s not gone, just dimmed
[  ] she still hides in old drawings and weird dreams like buried sea glass on a beach

[  ] i’m not all these people all the time.
[  ] but they live in me
[  ] in the sighs i swallow,
[  ] in the jokes i tell too loud,
[  ] in the poems no one reads.

[  ] i wear them like second hand hoodies,
[  ] hoping one won’t smell too much like someone else.
[  ] some days i throw them all on at once,
[  ] just to feel something that fits.
[  ] some days i stare at the pile
[  ] and don’t even bother.

[  ] i just want someone to notice
[  ] without me having to ask.
[  ] someone to say,
[  ] “i see you , even the parts you hide.”

[  ] until then,
[  ] Ill keep hiding my true self,
[  ] Untill I'm truly seen
[  ] Piecing myself together with glitter glue and stubborn hope,
[  ] soft rage and borrowed words.

[  ] and maybe i’m still becoming.
[  ] and maybe that’s okay.

I never thought I’d see the day
when your name felt strange in my mouth.
I miss you.
I miss who we were.
But loving you started to feel like holding my breath,
and after a while, I just needed air.

It was like a tie pulled too tight,
a knot I picked at ’til my fingers bled.
Some days, I still sit with the string in my hands,
trying to weave the loose threads of our friendship,
wondering how I let it break—
how I missed the moment we started unraveling.

It’s hard to see exactly where the hell I went wrong.
Maybe everywhere.
Maybe nowhere at all.

The world was always too loud for me—
clattering, crashing, caving in—
but you made it softer.
Like the sweater you gave me,
promising I’d always have you when I wore it.
You muffled the chaos just by being near,
pulling all the noise into your own sleeves,
leaving me just enough silence to breathe.

Now, when you laugh,
it sounds like it’s meant for someone else.

It shouldn’t be for someone else.
It should be with me.
It was always with me.

But you’ve changed.
You are exactly who you said you’d never be.
And I think you know that.
Maybe that’s why you left.

I grew up.
And you grew away.

I think you smoke too much.
I think your friends all ****.
We never did figure out why our parents fought so much.
Maybe they saw the ending before we did.
Maybe they recognized the wreck in us
before we were old enough to read the signs.

After you,
I gave up on love.
Left it folded at the back of my closet,
next to the sweater I never gave back.

I miss the old days
the sleepovers, the warmth,
sneaking in late and crashing on your floor,
blanket forts and cartoons at 2 a.m.,
fortresses of giggles and bruised hearts
we never talked about.

With you, I felt safe.

I’d leave my sweater on your porch,
you’d leave your bag under my stairs.

Don’t go back to your old place.
It was never really home anyway.
The locks are constantly getting changed,
the rooms are colder, emptier,
and the walls have already forgotten us.

I bet it still looks the same  
From when i ran away that day

We survived it by pretending,
by making forts out of broken things
but pretending doesn’t work forever.
Pretending only got us so far.

Don’t leave just yet.
There are still games we never finished,
stories still left untold,
lullabies stuck somewhere in our throats,
pieces of us tucked in the corners,
waiting to be found
like loose change in the old couch.

I do miss that old house
the old memories,
the giggles and the cries.
But the last light between us flickered.
Maybe it was always meant to burn out.

I always used to say,
“Stay a little longer.”
Stay, even when the lights went out.
Stay, even when it stopped feeling easy.
Stay, even when I stopped believing you would.

But that’s over now.
The light burned out a long time ago.
I kept using my matches to relight it,
but you didn’t want to use any of your own.

It doesn’t matter now.
But sometimes,
it still feels like it does.

I’m scared.
Scared I’ve been too vulnerable.
Scared I trusted too much.
Scared I’ve gotten my hopes up.

I should have known by now
nothing this good is ever real
Nothing ever has been.
Nothing ever will be.
And it’s time to accept that.

I have always been disappointed,
since I was a little girl,
and somehow,
I have made peace with that.

But this time,
this time I want it to be different.
I want it to stick.
I want you to stay.

I’m sorry I love too strongly,
too loudly,
too much.
But there’s something about you
something I can’t explain.

I have never felt safer before,
and yet,
I have never been more terrified.

I’m scared I will let down all my walls,
let you in,
only for you to look around
and decide you don’t like what you see.

I’m scared I’ll scare you away.
I’m scared you’ll be like everyone else.

I’m scared.
I want it to stick.
I want you to stay.

When your shadow touches mine,
that's the closest our souls ever get.

Lovers only from a distance,
lovers only in a daydream.

Our eyes play chase through the hallways,
a constant tag of exchanged looks
from you to me.

Pretend not to notice,
pretend not to care.

But I see you,
and sometimes I think you see me too.

You are the secret sigh,
the secret whisper of my heart.

Imaginary you smiles,
imaginary me believes it meant something.

I build a whole world in my head,
where you reach out,
where you choose me,
where you don't even hesitate.

But the truth is—
you don't know me.
You probably never will.

And all of this,
all of this ache,
all of this hope,
is something I made up.

So I’ll smile across the room,
catch your eye for a second,
and let the dream live a little longer.

Push and pull
that's what you always seem to do.
I pour my whole soul into you,
and you answer with echoes
faint whispers
fading before they reach me.

I stretch myself thin
just to meet you halfway.
I ask if you're okay
even when I'm not.
I hug you
like maybe it’ll fix everything.

And still
you push me away.
You pushed me away.
I should’ve seen it.
A sign,
a shift.
Maybe you started to realize.
Maybe I came on too strong.
Maybe you finally got tired
tired of me.
Maybe time caught up to the truth,
and now you see me
how everyone else does.

So I step back.
I give you space,
let silence swell between us like fog.
I become a ghost in my own care,
quiet, careful, watching from the edge.

But like a fish out of water,
your breath turns shallow
and you pull me back in.
Suddenly, you’re the one
making sure I'm okay.
You trace the shape of my boundaries,
say you’re worried,
say you’re always here.

And I wonder
which version of you is true?
The one who holds me close,
or the one who keeps letting go?

And maybe that's what we are
a tide that never decides
whether to crash or retreat.
But just like the push and pull of the ocean,
while rough, we flow in a kind of harmony.
And although my energy is starting to erode,
I stay
a shoreline, waiting,
weathered but wide open.
Because some tides never stop returning,
even when they forget why they came.

The weak breeze whispers nothing
the water screams sublime.
His feet shift, teeter-totter
deep breaths, stand back, it’s time.

Toes untouch the overpass
soon he’s water-bound.
Eyes locked shut but peek to see
the view from halfway down.

A little wind, a summer sun
a river rich and regal.
A flood of fond endorphins
brings a calm that knows no equal.

You’re flying now, you see things
much more clear than from the ground.
It's all okay, or it would be
were you not now halfway down.

Thrash to break from gravity
what now could slow the drop?
All I’d give for toes to touch
the safety back at top.

But this is it, the deed is done
silence drowns the sound.
Before I leaped I should've seen
the view from halfway down.

I really should’ve thought about
the view from halfway down.
I wish I could've known about
the view from halfway down—

You love her the way I love you,
soft and quiet,
with eyes that linger but never stay.

You speak her name
the way I whisper yours
in the poems no one reads
in the hopes that writing it
will make the hurting stop

It isn’t cruel
you’re not unkind
you just love
the way I do
hoping and hurting
never knowing
someone’s doing the same for you

I stand beside you
your anchor, your echo
the hand that’s there for comfort
guiding you through the night
I hold your pain
cheer you on
and laugh
when all I want to do is cry

I’ve loved you silently,
for almost a year now,
keeping my feelings hidden away,
in words I’ll never say.

And sometimes
I wish I was them
wish I had the light
that makes your eyes soften
the way they do for her

Wish I was the one
you looked at like that
like I was something more
than just your friend
When the days get too heavy,
I’m there to carry it with you,
I’ll bear the weight of your unspoken truths,
secretly knowing all too well how it feels.
I let you know you can tell me everything
let it all fall,
without needing to say more.

I listen,
never pushing,
but always hoping you’ll see
how much I wish
I could be more than just your friend.

I love you
just like you love them,
from the edge of the room,
always there,
always waiting,
for a moment
that never comes.

So we sit in this symmetry,
you pining, me silently aching,
both of us tangled in love
for someone who’ll never love us back
the way we wish they would