Breathing quickens,
But the heart stills.
Tears spill.
Your thoughts, your words hold one thousand different meanings,
And each one leaves me stunned.
Leaves me shunned.
I’m shamed and ashamed.
Our rhythm, our voices, our cadence—
They leave no room for me.
Each time you smile, my heart breaks and melts and stops, all at once.
I don’t begrudge you anything.
You know all this already.
Watch as I smile through it all.
I’m so pathetic.
But a good liar.
Go for a walk.
Try not to sob.
Try not to sing too loudly.
Stop myself from calling you.
Convince myself it’s all okay.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
Lather-rinse-repeat.
Lather rinse repeat.
Latherrinserepeat.
You get the point.
All I am is repetition.
Contradiction.
Research.Inspiration.
I’m getting off topic.
I could care less.
This is happy.
This is the face of happy, and I’ve never been more malicious in my sarcasm.
Every word that I bite back sidles down my throat.
Hot and venomous.
Le mort petit.
Except, really, it’s not.
Slugs. I’m swallowing hot, primordial swamp slugs.
I’ve never felt more in tune with myself.
I’m dying, slowly and painlessly.
It’s simultaneously the best and worst feeling in the world.
Hey, look, it’s every lie I told, every half-truth I believed.
All I need is my name on your lips, please.
Tell me what I want to hear?