one. i didn’t look in mirrors. glass refracts broken images that remind you of the way you shimmer shimmer unreal in your own mind. everything outside your head is in your head, still. one reality warping yet another. a gelatinous fragment of the passionate sun, melting. itself. in the mind. minding my business. two. i remember remembering, i remember saying i should remember, i remember forgetting, i remember-forget. three. the idyllic days gleam like resin. gilded fine-coat. one-track heart creates another track to run the same train across the same train of thought over and over and over and over and four. repetition tastes like metal because metal tastes like blood. in the glass, i see gap teeth, cheek- pudge. mirror smeared with cleaning solution. over lipstick. and blood. five. “what happened?” i. don’t know? i was blind when i saw it. i was deaf when i heard it. memories that feel like slow-motion static trickling through the air of a dead zone. memories that feel like breathing underwater. six. wailing i stumbled i crumbled i collapsed i t — cried my best (?) seven. i?
Keiran Elden is a young writer from New York. They have been passionate about writing since childhood, and they strive to create art that is as emotionally sincere as possible. Their work has been recognized and/or published by Cathartic Youth Literary Magazine, OUT Spoken Magazine, the Austin International Poetry Foundation, and the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards.