Wounds and Wonder

A cycle of poems «Everything Hurts and I Am Almost Famous»

I trace the cracks inside my chest like streets I used to know,
Where every heartbeat’s a detour, every memory’s a ghost.
We built our castles out of sparklers - bright but bound to fade,
Now I’m sweeping up the ashes while the echoes serenade.

I wear my pain like a vintage tee, washed out but still it fits,
A souvenir of stupid youth and all the s**t we risked.
The radio still plays our song, but it’s out of tune and slow,
Like a laugh that turned to silence, like a love we outgrew.

Oh, these wounds and wonder, got me split in two,
Half of me still loves you, half’s just passing through.
I’m a fireworks display in a thunderstorm,
Beautiful and broken, reckless, ripped, and torn.
Oh-oh-oh, I’m a flickering light,
Oh-oh-oh, burning out tonight.

I find your name in coffee stains and corners of my phone,
In every “almost” whisper when I’m staring at the road.
We were gasoline and matches, yeah, we lit up every room,
Now I’m choking on the smoke, dancing solo to our tune.

I tried to rewrite history with cheap ink and denial,
But the past just bleeds in highlight through the margins of my files.
You’re a shadow in my hallway, you’re a lyric left unsung,
A bittersweet reminder of the damage we’ve both done.

Oh, these wounds and wonder, got me split in two,
Half of me still loves you, half’s just passing through.
I’m a fireworks display in a thunderstorm,
Beautiful and broken, reckless, ripped, and torn.
Oh-oh-oh, I’m a flickering light,
Oh-oh-oh, burning out tonight.

Maybe heaven’s just a mixtape of the songs we couldn’t share,
A Polaroid of tangled hands and “I swear, I swear, I swear.”
But the film is scratched and fading, and the tape’s about to break,
So I’ll scream it to the void - was any of it fake?

So here’s to all the almosts and the nevers left unsaid,
To the “what ifs” and “could’ve beens” that haunt my heart instead.
I’ll wear my scars like constellations, map them out just to pretend,
That every wound was worth the wonder in the end.