“Sleep girl, hold me” – By Torashi

In the blue hush, between breath and forgetting,
I fold myself
Into the smallest version of me – a trembling insect
Hiding beneath the ribcage of night

Sleep is the only corridor
That still remembers my name
It unthreads its velvet spine, and lets me crawl through

There –
In that trembling chamber, where the moon leaks milk,
She waits

The Sleep girl,

Woven from hushed thunderstorms, with eyelids soft as wilted wings
And a mouth that speaks in blessings shaped like bruises
She gathers my wrists, my gashes like tiny red mouths
Telling secrets i am too afraid to say

And presses them to her lips, as though kissing open wounds could rewrite a boy.
“Little tiger,” she whispers,
Her voice a cracked bell, a feverish hymn

“Everything breaks for a reason.”

Her arms tighten. Not possessive, no dear,
Much of a noose made of your vows
Like im the last warm thing she is allowed to hold

Oh, my sleep girl,

I tell her
I am not brave enough to stay awake
That the world is too large, too sharp, too knowing
She tilts her head, smiling with sorrow

And cups my face

“Oh,” She hums

“Daytime lies to you. But I don’t. I never will.”

She promises – in that strange, holy way
That she won't leave
Only dream-creatures can– that she won't leave.
That she will guard my trembling, my emptiness, my blood singing
Through its new-open doors

In waking life, I cannot hold anything
Not hope, not courage
Not even the ache that should make me weep

But in sleep, she holds me
Like I am a relic buried in her palms
And i return to her, night after night
Cowardly
Faithfully

Because she is the only place where i am not unwanted

And she whispers again, as the world drowns behind her

“Close your eyes, little tiger. Let the dark carry you.”

“I’m here.
I’m here.
I’m here.”

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