Breathless Stranger

Even strangers are part of I
We won't fade in hegemony
Though we rage with sincerity
Even our will for change is commodified

Do our lives matter or only our deaths?
Passed around like cigarettes
On the internet, the rush of pain
Breathe too deep you could suffocate
Elegies etched in a flood of hate (Fuck you!)
Censors flare when the hurt is named (I'll kill you myself next time!)
Drunk on grief, but the rage is sober
Watch the same death over and over
Same throat that the kneecap crushed
Is same throat crushed by the noose
Same lungs that Katrina flooded
Are the same lungs that swallow fumes
In the mines, dredging machine organs
Or the tower block that went up in smoke
Same paralysis watches on from the comfort of the same fragile home

Suffocate
Born just to suffocate

Even strangers are part of I
We won't fade in hegemony
Though we rage with sincerity
Even our burning pain is commodified

The ocean vomits the corpses
Of the families we deported
The Earth bleeds at the borders
That have been sewn shut to keep order
The prisons disappear the poor
Instead of healing the root cause
Until the violence feels normal
Or we're overwhelmed with gore
And the same death still stalks us
Coz our haunting is algorithmic
And this strip search of our dignity
Gets passed on to our children
And what childhood even is this to witness your siblings as statistics?
An endless list of breathless strangers
Painful glimpses crushing flames with sickness

The root of domination is lovelessness
The delusion that one can overcome their own fear
By violating the sanctity of a stranger's breath