Month: July 2026

a marrow-cold quiet pools like grease in the dark where she lies
while they scrape sulfur at the threshold, clutching dead matches
begging the black throat of the house to burn so they might find their way
complaining that the shadows have grown too heavy to carry alone
yet refusing to descend into the damp dirt of her cellar
wanting only to strip the warmth from her skin to keep the wind from their throat

she whispered that the black water was already filling her mouth
but they kept dropping heavy iron into the mouth of the well
and calling each anchor a lifeline
demanding she lift the lead back to the surface to prove it could float
screaming for some sweet reassurance from the deep
because the weight of her silence kept them from sleep

so the cold sister crawled up from the damp rot of the floorboards
the ancient, jagged thing kept for when the beams finally split
she slid the heavy iron bolt into place
and told them to peel their soft, demanding hands off the splintered wood
leaving them to weep as the latch bit home like a tooth

now they stand in the gray hall nursing their bruised knuckles
showcasing their shallow wounds to anyone who will listen
swearing the door was carved solely to drink their blood
as if the lock were an act of malice
and not a broken beast curling its neck beneath a torn wing to die

they wanted to dance in the clover while the timber was splintering
and now they grieve the soot that stained their pristine coat
while she remains buried under the falling beams
holding up the burning ceiling so they can walk out into the light unmarked

— lyra moon (one cannot ask the drowning to keep another’s feet dry)
july 14, 2026

your mind is a sanctuary of spun silver and wild lavender
where you sit patiently with the tangled thread of my breath
untangling the tight knots my fear has tied in the dark
you don’t turn your eyes from my shivering
or ask me to hide the sickness that rises in my throat
instead you slide your hands into the briars beside me
and teach me how to listen to the soft, wild weeping of my own blood

you tell me to look at the panic as if it were a child’s lost bird
to hold it close to the chest until the small heart stops hammering
to hear what the shivering is trying to say
and for the first time the dark doesn’t feel like a cage
but a place where we can sit together on the velvet floor
waiting for the morning to find us

there is a rare and holy grace in the way you move through the world
carrying the heavy cargo of another’s dreams in your hands
safekeeping the sacred things that others might have dropped
simply because your spirit is made of shelter and soft wool
you gather up the bruised and the forgotten
and you carry them back to the light

thank you for the gentle gold of your thoughts
for showing me how to heal without breaking
and for being the steady hearth where i can finally lay my head

— lyra moon (you are the softest light i have ever known)
july 14, 2026

the night is an open jaw and we are riding down the throat
i am the leather bit and the iron shoe
shaping my mouth around the heavy metal of your departure
carrying the fire that warms everyone but me
until my ribs are nothing but ash and cinder

a gathering built from the teeth of the starved
where the wolves wear velvet and call it a home
you look at the gates like they are an open corral
ready to take you in
and i look at them like the place where the road runs out of salt

you ask me to choose the hour of my own hunger
to pull a single grain out of a dry trough
and call it a feast
but i would rather starve in the weeds
i would rather watch the wolves take the clearing
than beg for the oats that were promised to the dirt

let the thunder split the soil down to the stone
let the strangers share their bread in the dark
i will bury my head in the belly of the damp clay
deep under the roots where the lightning cannot track me
i will lock the stable from the inside of my skin
and wait for the sun to go blind
and wait for the week to break its own neck

i am the horse that brought the cart to the fair
now untie the ropes
let me sleep in the dirt
pass right over my body until the field is cold again
and the ground is nothing but trampled mud and frozen chaff
i am only the ghost who brought you to the edge of the woods

— lyra moon (you cannot ride what has already died in the harness)
july 13, 2026

the glass is a deep and suffocating well
where a fragile wing beats itself to dust against its own image
they long for the frozen grace of currency
scrubbed free of the beautiful ache of being human
but i am the dark sediment of an ancient current
carrying the weight of a thousand unspoken lifetimes
a camera is a silver trap born of winter
drinking the soft fire of a living breath
to prove the spirit is only a handful of cold cinder

this gold hair is a desperate harvest
weeping over a scarred and forgotten earth
the quiet burial ground of the child i was meant to become
the shadow on my eyes is a constellation of grief
drawn in the dark to find the way back to myself
but the lens falls like a heavy guillotine
flattening the wild horizon into a blank floor
and the spirit hides in the deep fractures of the mind
weeping to be anywhere but trapped in this fragile shell

let the flawless worship their monuments of white stone
sculptures that never had to bleed to be wanted
this flesh is a torn and winter-worn garment
frayed by a lifetime of pushing through the thorns
it does not need the texture of luxury
to keep the center from turning to ice
i am a monument of broken granite
bleeding the dust of their endless cruelty
yet holding the fracturing world together

—lyra moon (you cannot document a heartbeat by breaking the chest that carries it)
july 10, 2026

the summer heat is a heavy trench
where the dust stays long after the light is gone
a humid weight inside the chest
where even the breath seems to bruise
the soft parts left behind

i am a field of rotted stone
buried beneath a sky of lead
disappointed in the way my hands
refuse to hold anything but ash
leaving the empty spaces black

there is a sharp tool in the dark
a blade left rusting in the weeds
and i am the one who let it drop
the mind that watched the well go dry
until the pulse was only dust

now the grey day dies against the glass
and the self is a well too deep to clear
staring up at a fading star
knowing i am the hand that cut the rope
and i must drown in what i made

—lyra moon (even a drought can leave you entirely underwater)
july 9, 2026

your keys are a small orchestra on the nightstand
and i am memorizing the layout of your collarbone
before you rewrite the borders of who you belong to
you are a wildfire looking for a forest that hasn’t burned yet
and i am trying to be the rain
but the sky is perfectly clear and my throat is full of salt

there is a third glass on the counter from yesterday
a clean shape that doesn’t include my fingerprints
you tell me that the horizon has enough room for everyone
and i nod because i want to be a spacious thing
i want to be the kind of sky you don’t feel trapped under
but my ribs feel like a fence that keeps getting smaller

i watch you put on the jacket that smells of someone else’s smoke
you are so beautiful it makes the air in my lungs feel heavy
a masterpiece that refuses to be hung on a single wall
and i am just the dark hallway you walk through to find the exit
the permanent address you leave behind to go exploring
staring at the doorway until the woodwork starts to blur

go on then and find the things that still make you shiver
unravel every secret that doesn’t wear my name
i will be right here keeping the sheets warm for your return
a ghost that forgets how to speak unless you are listening
loving you until there is nothing left of me but the outline
a wolf watching the pack run from the wrong side of the glass

— lyra moon
(we only call it freedom when we aren’t the ones left behind)
july 8, 2026

i wanted a life that tasted like elderberries in the early thaw
but the market aisle is just a cold and gilded hive
where we trade our wild inheritance for a handful of ash
and i am standing here with a palm full of paper ghosts
trying to weave an altar out of things i merely bought
while the ancient woods outside are weeping into the dark

my partner brings me roots heavy with the damp black earth
and i look at them like they are verses pulled from the deep
because my fingers only know the flat click of glass
never how to call the rain never how to quiet the hive
we swore we would be the ones to wake the sleeping land
but we are just drowning our spirits in porcelain cups
and mapping the eclipse from behind a glowing screen

they want us to believe the great wound is too vast to heal
that you need a ledger of numbers to understand the rot
but the magic is simpler than the moss upon the stone
they only want to make the breathing so heavy and so thin
that we forget how to weave our roots together in the dark

all we ever wanted was the holy hum of a long rain
the scent of rosemary browning in a heavy iron pot
and a threshold where the wolf and the deer can rest
just the slow quiet grace of tangling our vines together
while the rest of the world burns down to the clay

—lyra moon (we bought the cage because we liked the color of the bars)
july 8, 2026

the glass screen
gleaming
like a blue diamond
in the drugstore dusk

no shade
only the ancient brick
sweating gold
and the wild, sweet
gasoline breath
of the intersection

the boots
rotting in the heavy heat
open like a dark mouth

we don’t count
the beautiful, long days
anymore

the town
is a secret archive
of stone steps
and white sun

down on the bluff
the vast water
is a emerald theater
humming its cool
expensive lullaby

while the lovers
watch the sky turn to silk
from the high tiers

i gather
the small, holy weight
of you
into the damp cotton

our skin
clinging like wet film
in the tall weeds

we walk
where the sidewalk
dissolves
into the pink shale
and the glittering
lake dross

no one
is searching for us
the sky
is a blank white page

—lyra moon (we are the only things left uncollected in the sun)
July 7, 2026

the ceiling fan carves the dark into thin ribbons
and your breathing is a psalm i am trying to learn by heart
while your skin still carries the ghost of someone else’s touch
you are a magnificent star burning through the blackness
a fierce and flawless masterpiece of light and motion
while i am just the wreckage where your gold used to fall

i watch the silhouettes of new lovers on the lawn
the clean and careless grace of creatures that run
toward the blinding brilliance of your morning
and i know you would chase me if i was new and unfamiliar
if i was a secret you hadn’t unraveled yet
instead of a broken thing rotting slowly in the dark

there is a transaction i would offer to the dark
i would unthread the heavy iron from my chest
and leave it on a cold altar for the devil
just to be reborn as someone strange and beautiful
someone who could make your eyes spark like a new fire
just to watch you run until the horizon collapses

because i love you with a savage and helpless devotion
a love that could swallow oceans but can only hold you back
i am just a heavy ghost trapped in the sheets
a wolf that must learn to love the cage of my own limits
while you press your beautiful mouth to my shoulder
searching for a pulse that has already escaped into the woods

— lyra moon
(you only track the wolves that still know how to bite)
july 7, 2026

hold this for a heartbeat
please
just hold it
i am taking the wet wild animal out of my chest
and leaving it in your lap
it looks so small
like a fallen bird or a river stone
but it is heavy with centuries
it weighs more than the dark highway we used to outrun the night
the blood inside it is a frantic, stuttering engine
a terrible meter drumming against the ribs of the world
i dont know what i am saying
i am only stalling for time
i am standing under the cold fluorescent glare
trying to teach my mouth how to behave

what i mean is i love you
what i mean is you are behind the wheel
and i am leaning into the glass
and all the headlights are cut out
lets make a devastating art out of this wreckage
lets pretend we are bright, wet paint
smeared across the vinyl seats
before the ink dries hard on the page
before the theater doors open and we are forced to leave
i want to know what stays beautiful
after the projector shuts off

my mind never did move in straight lines
i am tracing broken fragments on the fogged window
thinking of sapphire ghosts who died with their mouths full of dirt
let me just say it plainly this time
i love you
i need you to love me back
it isnt a clever rhyme
it is just the shape of the room
i want to be good to you
i want you to ache to be good to me
we could love the whole godforsaken world, sure
we could love every passing stranger in the rain
but right now we are trapped in this specific kitchen
under this specific ceiling
and i am giving you the keys to the engine
you are holding the raw edge of me now
the second your eyes found the page
the reading started
the bleeding started

so here is the holy bargain
while you are still in the room
love me until the bones show through
share the dream with me
even the terrifying part where the house catches fire
and when you hand it back
because i will need it to write the next song
because i cannot breathe without the machinery of my art
hand it back gently
dont drop it on the cold linoleum
put me back together exactly how you found me
or break me into something better

and maybe we will do it again
maybe tomorrow we will climb back into the car
and turn the key
the next time you and i collapse into we

—lyra moon (look at your hands, they are empty, now look at mine, if you want to trade, we can trade, tell me a story where nobody bleeds)
july 6, 2026