Crystallised Salt

by Georgie Andrews

this is a violent kind of calm.

it's a deafening sort of silence that seems to linger like acid on the back of your tongue - because you can’t hold it down anymore, in the back of that crowded room where the lights burn into the back of your skull and the shouts blur into nothingness.

it’s gasping for air on a bitter October evening when your ribs threaten to burst through the seams of this fabricated body that feels foreign, as sharp against bare skin bleeds through - almost in comfort like smashing cabernet onto cream carpet and is this what it’s like to be alive?

it’s realising that the ringing in your ears sounds like screaming and it can’t be your own because the tightness in your chest is slowly suffocating you, but it sounds oh so familiar urging you to let go - it’s okay you don’t have to feel like this anymore.

it’s holding clenched fist in open palm - leading you home after a night that makes your head feel heavy and the oxygen and alcohol burns through your body but at least you feel something, right? and all that remains the next day are regret and salt crystals under your tired eyes.