empathy is a superpower

empathy is a superpower I can't turn off
to me, people are not puzzles but paintings
with corners peeking out from hiding places

empaths are sponges that soak up pain from the air

I see you, no I see you
I can win every match of hide & seek
'cause when you speak I swallow your truth
and it becomes a part of me

if I donate my body to science when I die
they'll cut open my cadaver and gasp because

my lungs are lined with curling edges of photographs
of you and me and everyone whose
inhibitions I inhaled

my liver is filled with tears, a saltwater swimming pool
surrounded by deflated buoys my spirit rented out
to anyone who was drowning

in between each rib is a shelf lined with books:
stories and aches, poems and prayers
bound and chronicled for you

my clavicles are the East and West wings
of a memory museum that houses the ones
you were too broken to carry alone

empathy is a superpower I can't turn off

if only I just saw through walls
instead of facades and well-worn false faces

I wish my eyes only melted windshields and
not your shields for the battlefield
that awaits you when the sun comes up

you can't hide from me
sometimes I wish you could
I didn't ask to see you
I didn't ask permission, but
I can just get in even if
it's not my mission

and when I find myself wishing to die
it's not because I have nothing to live for
it's just that I didn't ask to be a
wishing-well guardian of
broken-winged birds and broken-stringed crickets

and sometimes it feels like too much
like some saying about straws and camels
but I think straws serve as a poor metaphor
for people's burdens because, well...
they matter too much

3/23/17