There are shadows
that don’t need light to exist.

They find me
in the stillness—
no footsteps,
just the pressure of presence.

A sharpness,
like something once broken
still echoing through the body.

The pain isn’t always real.
But it’s always there.

Ghost fingers,
tight around the heart.
Scars that never bled.
Memories I never chose to keep.

I don’t speak of it.
Not because I can’t.
Because I don’t know how to name
what has no face.

But somewhere,
between each phantom ache
and the silence that follows,
a flicker stirs—
thin, but alive.

And I follow it.
Even if I don’t know where it leads.

the sorrow isn’t poetic
it’s thick
cold
mud that pulls
without mercy

every breath
feels borrowed
from something deeper
that wants me quiet

I move
but nothing lets go—
chains wrapped in memory
hands I never asked to hold me

somewhere in that silence
a spark
quivers
burning bitter in my veins
small
but mine

I don’t know if this is healing
or fury
but I burn
everything behind me
to make room
for something else

the dark doesn’t disappear
it just flinches

and I
with bleeding hands
still climb.

I am the silence between words,
the shadow that slips unnoticed
through crowded rooms.
No one looks my way,
no eyes linger,
not even for a moment.

I walk past like a ghost,
my name barely a whisper in the air,
dissolving before it reaches anyone's ears.
I speak, but it feels like I’m talking to walls,
hoping the vibrations will reach somewhere,
someone.

But I am always alone.
Invisible threads weave through me,
tightening as the world goes on,
oblivious,
unaware
of the emptiness I carry.

I am not part of the conversation.
I am the pause,
the blank space,
the forgotten afterthought.
I try to shout,
but my voice only echoes in my chest,
bouncing back unanswered.

In the sea of faces,
I am the one that doesn’t register,
the one who blends into the background,
like a painting left to collect dust.
I exist,
but I am not seen.
I feel the weight of this truth,
heavy in the hollow places inside me.

I am a story untold,
a face without a name,
a heartbeat no one notices
because it’s too faint to matter.

But I keep breathing,
I keep moving.
Because even if I’m invisible,
I am still here,
still waiting
for someone to see me.

There’s a silence we share,
not of distance, but understanding,
an echo of words unspoken,
the heavy weight of thoughts that linger,
a quiet that understands the weight of your skin,
the racing of your pulse when you’re still,
the sound of your mind when it calls for rest.
I see the shadows you walk through,
and though they may look different from mine,
they too are haunted.
This is your space now,
in the silence, in the air between us.
Take it.
Breathe.
You’re never as alone as you feel.
The weight will pass.
There’s light in this dark.
And as you walk through it,
know I’ve walked here too.

I write,
not to remember,
but to hold on to the fragments
of a past that never lets go.

The ink spills,
a dark river,
draining into the paper,
painting the demons in full color.
They dance in the corners of my mind,
silent,
but loud enough to echo
in every word,
every syllable,
as if they want me to surrender.

But I won’t.
Not today.
Not in this space.

I lean into the shadows,
but I don’t let them pull me under.
I use them,
familiar faces,
unforgiven scars,
ghosts I can almost touch.
I let them circle,
dancing dangerously close
to the edge of my sanity,
but I don’t let them hold me.

I write because I need to see them.
Not to glorify the ache,
not to make it beautiful,
but to acknowledge it—
to say,
“I know you’re there,
but you won’t control me.”

In this twisted ritual,
I channel the darkness,
put it on paper,
where it can stay,
where it can’t crawl back inside me
and make my heart bleed again.

I dance the line,
between facing the past
and losing myself in it.
I stare down the abyss,
knowing it can’t swallow me
if I keep my feet moving,
if I keep writing.

So I write.
Because sometimes,
the only way to survive the storm
is to let it rain.

“Be a man.”
Not just a voice—
a chorus.
Television scripts, locker room laughs,
teachers with sharp smiles,
uncles at funerals.
The world said it over and over
until it echoed in my chest
louder than my heartbeat.

Toughen up.
Men don’t cry.
Grow a spine.
Don’t be weak.

They called it growing up.
I called it disappearing.

So I swallowed softness,
one emotion at a time—
compassion, fear,
grief, joy.
Tied them in a knot
and buried them behind my ribs
where no one could see.

Pain was a private ritual.
Shame, a second skin.
I learned to laugh when it hurt.
To bleed in silence.
To treat vulnerability
like a sickness I couldn’t afford to show.

They told me I was strong.
And I am—
but at what cost?

There are days
I touch my own reflection
and feel nothing.
There are nights
when I want to scream,
but all that comes out
is a breath
too tired to be heard.

This is what boys are made of:
wires where nerves should be,
mirrors that never show weakness,
and fists
clenched so long
we forgot how to hold anything gently.

I survived.
I adapted.
I became the man they wanted.

But sometimes,
when it’s quiet,
I ask myself—

what did I lose to become him?