A Girl Within a Girl

She didn’t see the off-road avenue

to the left side of

the sewage plant across the road from the dilapidated garage.

It was all but lined in gold for her,

and it shined like the waking rays of morning’s first gentle sunbeams.

But the poor thing was tired,

and each of her peers took a gouge at her eyes, splintering her vision with their criticism.

She never wanted to be centerstage, I tell you!

She only wanted to be a friend to a stranger.

A falling star to grace hope in a misguided world.

And look how they circle around her and spit!

Steering her from the lighted path that is her fate,

and backing her into that dark well that harbors her every dreaded fear.

She falls.

An endless pitfall, but not without the title of a nightmare come alive.

The saliva-stained walls that capture her silent screams

suffocate her

and scald her flesh.

She is only a delusion inside her own madness.