stacks of inked papers pile high up

in my messy, wooden home,

shuddering from the weight

of its unstable foundation

paper houses and paper towns

loom over me to 

engulf the dusty, cracking

ground scattered in broken

pencil tips

and crumpled sticky notes

layered high 

like sheets of linen that stay tucked

away in molding closets,

I race away from endless 

paper buildings 

that collapse and fall

and drown me in cuts 

of blood 

and ink 

and stress

and a mess

of nothing

because 

Thursdays and Fridays

don’t mean anything to me

when I can’t seem to 

to see anything else

but the stacks of documents

that leer over

my shaking shoulders 

I punched a hole in my wall

the other day 

all for an equation

that wouldn’t untangle

in my tired brain—

plaster fell through 

cardboard walls

and my hand came out bleeding,

from paper cuts

all those paper buildings,

constructed high enough

to block out the sky—

for nothing but 

a single letter that determines

who I am now

and who I will

become

paper cities

suffocate me

until my lungs tighten

from the unknowns

of another day;

candles that

flicker in dark ink stains

try to make sense of

velvety thoughts

that won’t stop

swirling.

And nothing seems to

wake me up again

from my sleep-deprived

mind as

paper sheets rain

down from the sky,

blocking me from

dreaming about the

sights I’ll 

never 

get to see.