Adena M'lynn's Voice

It starts with the curve— a crescent umoon painted across a tired face. The kind of light that doesn’t come from stars, but from habit. People say, “what a beautiful smile .” They don’t see the scaffolding beneath it —  how heavy steel can bend when the soul’s foundation is cracked. It’s a mask , but not for deceit. It’s survival. A small, trembling flag in the middle of a storm . The teeth shine but the tongue hides— words swallowed, tears disguised as laughter . Sometimes the corners ache, like old wounds stitched too tight. But I keep wearing it. Because if I take it off, someone might see the hollow. And hollows are hard to explain when the world prefers a smile.

Listen here.  YouTube  Life is a Bible. Outside, leather-bound, creased like valleys carved by time, worn smooth by hands that needed answers long before they had words for their questions. On the front— Holy Bible. Not just a title. Not just gold letters. But a cry. A longing. Stamped deep enough to last a lifetime. A reminder that somewhere in these pages— there’s my directions home. I flip to the table of contents, and wonder if my life has one. Would it list beginnings… betrayals… wars fought in silence? Would joy be a Psalm— short, melodic, gone too soon? Would warning be a prophet’s voice— fire spilling from his mouth? There’s a space for my name— scribbled in childhood handwriting, crooked, innocent, a little girl wanting to believe, she belonged in the story. And there’s a tree. Roots in Eden. Branches heavy with apples and nuts— fruit sweet enough to nourish, shells hard enough to break me. Wisdom and foolishness, growing side by side. I learned young— one bite can bo...

There’s a pill for that— tiny, chalk-white, a promise pressed into her palm. She eats her hallucinations whole, swallowing shadows until her throat tastes like ghosts. She’s tired. Bone-tired. Tired of the static buzzing in the corners of her mind, tired of her name echoing back at her like a warning. She’s tried everything— kindness, (well, sort of), tight smiles and tighter lips, praising instead of pleading, restraining her hunger until her ribs rattle like a cage. Restricting her wants, minimizing her desires, folding herself smaller and smaller like a prescription slip she can’t afford to fill. And still, the noise comes back. The ache returns. The smell hits her first when the bottle cracks open— a sharp, chemical sting that clings to her fingertips. Then the taste— coating her tongue, like souring guts turning inside her, a bitterness that even water can’t drown. The pills line up wheat fields on her nightstand, each one promising a softer silence that never lasts. She wonders i...

Every morning, I pull in They tell me, just keep going, like I’m some truck stop cowboy with an endless road stretched out in neon lines. But mental illness— it ain’t a smooth ride. It’s a gas can strapped to my back, sloshing heavy with fumes that choke before they fuel. Every morning, I pull into the station, coin jar empty, pockets turned inside out, yet they say, filler-up and roll on. So I siphon from yesterday’s pain, pouring it into today’s tank, driving on borrowed fire that burns more than it moves me. Sometimes the gauge lies. Reads full when I’m bone dry, reads empty when I’m blazing. Either way, I’m stranded on a shoulder where hope is just another car that passes by without stopping. Mental illness is the gas you can’t afford, the tank that leaks slow but steady, the smell that sticks to your hands long after you’ve washed them clean. And the diesel— thick in the air, always a reminder that “fuel” and “funeral” share the same breath. Still I grab the nozzle, fumble with sh...

When a house burns down, the fire is not just flame. It is the law, the decree, the invisible match struck by hands that never walked our floors, never sat at our tables, never heard our stories. When a house burns down, it is not only timber that collapses, but the rhythm of mornings— the smell of tortillas warming, the father’s boots by the door, the child’s backpack leaning on the wall waiting for tomorrow. But tomorrow does not come, because tomorrow is held hostage by paperwork and borders. When a house burns down, it is not the fire alone that robs us, but the separation it enforces: a mother left behind, a father taken away, children holding photographs like fire extinguishers too small to save what matters. When a house burns down, neighbors come running with buckets, but no one can douse the flames of policy. No one can smother the crackle of absence that eats through generations. When a house burns down, questions rise in the smoke, Who decides whose love is legal? Who counts...