january ejected me into this new life
feet first, cords that I tried to cut wrapped thrice round
my throat
choking me
I work myself to the bone to make the best of
this breech rebirth but there’s still all this wrath
that I cannot shake
you tell me to let it go but it’s seared into my
bones, it’s what keeps me going
I have nothing else left to give
january, you are a cruel mother
and I am exhausted from pushing myself
through your days
once more unto the breach
-Allēna 1/20/2026
you have taken the world that I was
and left me empty
craving
longing
is there anything that I can use to fill the chasm
on the side of the bed where you once slept
I stumble home
if I can even still call it that
for in the taking, you
took more than just yourself
you took everything that meant something to me
from this space and left it ruined
just like me
now even the flies are starving
sobs wrack my threadbare chest
everyone that I once knew is turning
away from me and into their own personal
darkness, tired
can you come back and give me anything
even undo me again
please
-Allēna 1/11/2026
I was so scared before and after that my chest felt like it had been hit with a frying pan, though..
-Allēna
You can listen to the episode here.
-Allēna
faceless blessings in disguise
looking askance at gift horses
with bejeweled eyes
are they empty or full to the brim
do I hoard them
or do I give them away
is it finally my time to come out of hiding
after all the time that was stolen from me
this little thing is winking at me offscreen
I think it's telling me everything is gonna be alright
but that's what they said before
and if I stuck them in a lineup their dead eyes would all glint the same
people told me when I
got up from the piano bench that fame
would be inevitable
I was always going to be someone
I was always going to do something
(as if I wasn't already a gift)
time after time I tried to run
time after time I tried to just be
dissolve into winter nights and simply be
unremarkable with the man I swore I had chosen
but what I know of myself is in the doing
all I know of myself is in what I choose to give
away
I let the rest of myself die
collapsed into dead star self hatred
lost somewhere deep in kaleidoscopic shadow
-Allēna 12/21/2025
But I got so fuckin triggered that I couldn’t do it, which honestly says a lot about how effective the writers and organizer were, and ended up eating my favorite Milwaukee comfort food, Mad Chicken, instead. Emerson was also a phenomenal comfort.
-Allēna
about our experiences at St. John’s College in Annapolis, MD
I was only 18 when you lost me
it was more than just a flesh wound
I had just lost my father, it was second semester
and everyone there was different, more liberal or
left leaning than me
alcoholics alone in their dorms, trying to wash
away their sins and praying for whiskey and the pulsing of drums to absolve them.
they talked about God as though he were just
another thing to dismantle, unfathomable to
my sheltered, rubbed raw mind
and you dashed me open like I was an egg,
forgotten and left over after breakfast,
carelessly tossed over the railing
you mishandled all of me
when my friends told you that the same boy
who'd used me up with empty promises
and then discarded me like I was nothing
had done it to at least 4 other women,
you did nothing, only sat there on your pedestal
on your impenetrable hill, and allowed him to
continue.
I learned about it all and I never forgave you
and I wanted to kill him.
I was only 18.
I was only 18 when I became a corporeal ghost
barely breathing
barely eating, barely getting out of bed
haunted by the boy who'd raped me
haunted by my father's death
haunted by the fact that you'd still allow him
to share these halls with my friends.
haunted by the gaping void my life had become
see, my friends talked about God and saints
like they were dead. Little did they know that
I was becoming one of the bodies. all because you refused
to listen.
I was only 18.
I was only 18 when you saw me slipping away
and still you demanded more, more blood from
an already fragile stone. all the help you gave
only made it worse.
I'm still finding pieces of myself in the dark 10
years later. I still grieve for all the time I lost.
how foolish of me to think that this was home.
how could I have known any better?
I was, after all, only 18...
-Allēna 12/7/2025
you asked me once
suspended over a chasm of grief
why I loved you
I couldn't string the words around you to tell you then
so I shall attempt to tell you now
you are a lavender field
earth still wet from spring rain
and loving you is learning to dance again
hair still wet through the rows of flowers on
these crippled legs
no matter how long it takes to get the steps right
no matter how long it takes to move without falling
you are a game of chance
and loving you is taking the tenderest risk I've
ever known
loving you is lilac, pale blue, and gold like the
subtle ring around your irises when you look at
me
loving you is slow mornings and evenings that
always seem to go too fast
loving you is enough memories to fill a Martian
year and enough emotion to fill an entire planet
loving you is savoring 1001 days and nights
for all they're worth and never, ever taking each
other for granted
loving you is allowing myself to be broken open
and reborn, again and again
loving you is allowing you to do the same
and loving you is meeting the people you love
(because it's never just been us against
this crazy world)
and finding that I trust you even more after doing
so because they're some of the finest people
I've ever known
you are multiverses
you are adventure
you are passion and fire
you are the ripple of time dancing
you are everything and nothing at once
loving you is learning to hold all of that
in a single touch (and God does it feel so good)
I bet everything I had and then some on you
because the moment I saw you, I knew I was
yours
and I would fucking do it again in a heartbeat
that is why I love you.
-Allēna 12/1/2025
This is called “body politics.” Here is the performance.
-Australis, he/him, hello, I’m new.
