On New Year’s Day I woke up surrounded by friends who had just fallen asleep hours ago. After watching the sunrise, and sharing secrets, we had all crashed as our adrenaline finally faded. The cold floor jolts me awake, and I feel the footsteps of my companions creeping around. My mind goes to one line, “I’ll be cleaning up bottles with you on New Year’s Day.” This beautifil lyric by Taylor Swift stopped me in my tracks. Whenever I had previously listened to this song, I envisioned true romantic love, in a relationship with soulmates, people who were there for each other during the good and the bad. However, hearing this song in my head completely caused me to reimagine my perspective. Love songs can be completely platonic. I was not surrounded by anyone who I was involved with romanticaly, yet I had never felt more love. The bond of my seemingly evergreen group of friends. We had all come from different journeys, and had experienced different hardships, yet somehow, we all came together on New Year’s Eve, stayed the night and had entered the start of a new year together. Now when I hear this song, I do not think about how I don’t feel that way toward anyone, but rather, how lucky I am to feel a different way towards an entire group of people.

nothing is forever

~ and yet ~

you never fade

an i m a g i n a r y friend

who never said

“goodbye”

/i’m\so/lost\in/you\

i can’t find my way out

of your mazes

eyes

OPEN

or

>closed<

{it’s all the same}

the only thing that changes

1s/the/date

as my youth

b

l

e

e

d

s

a

w

a

y

you grow

STRONGER

》a shadow《

cast by bitter sunshine

f/i/l/t/e/r/i/n/g/ t/h/r/o/u/g/h/

the cracks of my prison

isn’t it time to let go?

but when people left

[when my world s h a t t e r e d ]

when time

》》sped up 》》

and left me far

b e h i n d

you stayed

》the same《

the taste of pain

should teach us happiness

but smiles hurt more

laughs steal the air from my lungs

leave me gasping for oxygen

as your waves close over my head

(i never learned to swim)

the mirror mocks me

: who I was :

[who I could be]

i can’t reconcile her,

//who I am\\

i’m scared of you

i’m scared of

me

i want to get away

but you would follow me

even in death

when the stars blink out slowly

one

by

one

when the man

in

the

moon

no longer dreams

of

the

earth

when the sun

hides

his

face

to cry in silence

and

we

wander

over sleepless cities

because

s

h

a

t

t

e

r

e

d

constellations

cannot guide the night

nor

break the day