Dandelion Yellow

By Skylar Nipper

I'm lying on my bedroom floor

Listening to an album

That only ever played before

Within the headphones of a kid

Who lived in a house on a crumbling cliff.

I sing the words to my cat,

Who's dozing off beside me,

And I close my eyes.

The setting sun paints my wall

In dandelion yellow

(My classmate's favorite color)

And I'll be going to bed soon.

Tomorrow I will wake up

And leave for school, and I'll sing

To myself on the way there.

The sound of the living room TV

Floats through the walls

And no one is angry.

Tomorrow I will wake up,

And I am excited to sleep because

Tomorrow, I will wake up.

Have you ever wondered what it feels like

When life leaves you,

But your heart still beats?

Tomorrow, I will wake up

And that in itself is a marvel

Because when my heart was only beating,

I didn't think I would. I didn't care.

Have you ever wondered what it feels like

To accept the sound of a silent heart?

I'm lying on my bedroom floor

And the music is seeping

Into my heart, messy and alive.

I sing the words soft and bad

And it doesn't matter,

Because I can sing them.

My eyes are closed, because

There is nothing I need to see,

Nothing I need to watch;

But when I open them,

The sunlight is sparkling.

Dandelion yellow is my classmate's favorite color.

I know that because I talked to them,

And when I spoke, my voice wasn't cobwebs.

Tomorrow, when I sing to myself,

My breaths between lines

Will fill my lungs with I want to be here.

On my wall, there are photos of me

With bright pink hair and vibrant clothes.

She's smiling at the camera, teal braces showing.

I don't know her. She doesn't know me.

Yet she stays pinned to my wall

Because she may be dead,

But I can finally look at her again.

Her face is no longer a fun house mirror

Showing me everything I'm void of.

I may not know who I am now that she's gone,

But I will meet myself all over again.

I may not know this world that I'm in,

But I know that it's new, and that means

I have a chance to live in it.

Once I had finally cried, finally felt

My chest cave in and stared

At a yellowed ceiling through my red eyes

In the night that used to fill every hour;

Once I had cried and felt a spark,

A light in my chest that said

"Maybe, maybe, maybe I will live,"

I knew for the first time

How precious and fragile this spark was. 

Have you ever wondered what it feels like

To accept the sound of a silent heart,

Only to be met with beating?

Beautiful, beautiful beating.

In a way, I guess I did die.

But I hear this beating now and I know

That I cannot let it fall silent,

I cannot let this spark die again

Because my heart is messy and alive,

And the beautiful beating in my chest

Finally speaks words so honest:

"This life is hard,

But I want to live it.”

By Skylar Nipper