Graffiti covers the walls with bright bursts of color

Pinks, purples, blues, and greens

The light filters in from the broken rafters

Reflected in the puddles of water

That soaked through the rotting roof of this hidden world

The ground was damp to the touch, but that didn’t stop me.

I look around me at the obscene words and artistic curves and slopes of the letters

Some think it’s vandalism

But you can find beauty in everything.

I imagine people climbing in here, seeing the cracked and decaying walls

Deciding to make the place beautiful,

Through brushes and strokes of paint

Leaving their mark in color.

I imagine people coming here to hide from the world

Full of anger and hurt and loss.

Taking it out on these defenseless walls

Which have no one to protect them.

I imagine people coming here with friends

Discovering this hidden gem

Alone, forgotten, abandoned

Thinking that for a while, they were the only people in the whole entire world

I imagine a nobody

Someone with no one

No one to explore with

Hiding from the world, convinced no one will find them here.

Coming to their true home

The place they feel most welcomed in

The rusty, squeaky doors,

Embrace them with open arms

Alone, they stay,

Smelling the stale air,

Hearing the creaks of the roof

After a while, it becomes comforting.

Familiar.

Their own.

How would I know?

I don’t. I can only imagine.

So that’s what I do.