i am swimming and the water is hot
my blood burns red-hot in my face, my whole body
i can't stop thinking, and every word takes over my mind like a termite infestation
there are flashes of wars i've never been in or run from or don't exist at all
i see them bleed and cry out and feel their pain and shake inside, but i need to keep on swimming
one more, you're halfway done, almost there
and then he says "two more! go." and i want to scream, because each termite makes me feel like clawing my way out of myself
there's torture and bombings and ash, enough to choke on
spontaneous lines of poetry flood in at random intervals, and they're beautiful but i can't write them down anywhere
somehow, i know that i will never remember them
after i leave the pool—smelling of chlorine and sweat, water trailing my aching limbs—i dress in the locker room
wanting to be comfortable, i leave the bra in my bag and go
but i'm in the hall and all i can think is do they see? do they notice? are they going to hurt me? are they staring? i'm scared of everyone—god, there's three of them now.
i turn up the music in my headphones and pull my jacket over my chest and still can't feel safe
even though it's bright and there are others and it's only a bend, it'll probably be okay
it's still echoing and i'm thinking of how the brightness and the people and the distance didn't matter for the others, might not matter for me
later, i remember to scream "fire!" instead of "rape! help!"

i've never been r*ped or harassed but this is inspired by a rlly bad day i had. i was feelin weird mentally and all thru swim practice i kept thinking of all this dark shit i saw in the news and in books n stuff, and i felt rlly overwhelmed. i thought of some good lines too but i couldn't remember them by the time i finished practice, and i did forego the bra that day. in the hall, i felt rlly unsafe for no logical reason other than stories n statistics n things. so i ended up writing abt it.

anyways, have a nice day/evening/night y'all !!