Asylum

Tucked deep

inside a belief

A shell

layered with thick

pearl and pain

Bound and gagged

by the yarns

of someone else’s

weaving

Inseparable

without boundaries

Locked-in

Floating just above

the ceiling,

I look down—

an empty room

waiting for a tenant

to return,

only to find the walls are breathing

in the weak and the wounded,

where the old tapes spin

and a voice cuts through the static,

sharp as a brand-new blade,

carving deep into the soft tissue

of the dark

Waiting

October 2026 Poetry Project

Day 9 of 31