She tears her voice for him.
He couldn’t hear her on the field
The crowd of players too loud
His pain a deafening roar

Blinded by his mistakes
Choking in his self-doubt
A chamber of his own despair
She begged to join him there.

Her turn to play came
He didn’t show for her game
She wished he’d cheered for her.
She searched the stands
He was nowhere.

He arrived
At last
He was there for her
By then
She was on the bench.

Hey
Hello
How are you
Can you hear me?
Oh, I’m sorry.
You want me to say your name when I’m talking to you.
You want to know I acknowledge you.
Say your name, because you want me to see you.
See your effort.
But you don’t see me.

You never wanted tea.
You don’t even like tea—
It lingers on your lips,
the scalding fear of it burning,
it twists its way inside,
leaving a sickly warmth in its wake.

You prefer cold tea,
sharp and distant,
they tell you it lacks flavor,
warmth is the point—
the richness, the indulgence.
warm tea churns your stomach,
fills it with a heat you never asked for.

You drank his tea
Only a few sips
To prove you could like it,
You had to prove it to him,
You always hated the feeling.

He respected you for a while,
Stayed content with your cold tea,
you knew he was just trying to like the taste.
He was doing what you did,
Trying to stomach the poison.

He poured his tea on you,
let it spill into your clothes,
seeping in with unwanted warmth.
The stains would never wash out
clinging to your skin it left you ill,

You never wanted tea.
Not from him.
Not at all.

She’s seen it all before,
the same cycles.
Disappointment taught her to brace for the fall.

She tried to normalize it,
Dull the sting,
She wished for the echoes to finally rest.

That tiny wish grew,
a parasite feeding her pain.
She became unrecognizable—
a patchwork of others wishes
stitched together with the threads of her love.

Nothing stays the same forever.
She was the very thing she feared,
trapped in the circle she swore to break.

So she rips herself apart,
threads her pieces with lies,
sewing herself together
with the desires of others.
Praying for her is enough.

But people change.
She tears herself to shreds,
always the parasite,
siphoning their pain,
leaving behind her poison
in hands that never asked for it.

She is rotten.
She rots
And rots
And rots.
She doesn’t try to change

Her thoughts are filth.
How she thinks of herself
Others
She is disgusting

She covers it up
With makeup
With music
With lies.

Eventually truth seeps through.
She tries to distance herself-
Hoping it will cover the stench.

Those who are close have seen her truth
They always leave
She is broken.

She helps others with everything she has
Hoping it will purify her
It fills in her missing pieces
Eventually, she is out of holes

So she makes new ones.
She carves herself into shambles

Hatred oozes from her new sculpture.
For herself
For others
For the past
For the present
For the future.

The fear of what she’s done-
Who she’s become
Consumes her
She is corroded.

So she thinks
She lies
And she rots.

You are toxic.
You hate yourself
People scramble to tell you that you shouldn’t
That you are amazing

The only truth is that
You.
Are.
Toxic.

You have built so many lies around yourself
To keep yourself safe
Do you know what you are?

You are a pathological liar
You write the script
You are the creator of your own hell.
You hate that you do it,
You can’t stop,
You won’t.

Gagged for so many years,
You were scared of what twisted thing would come out
You should have kept your voice locked away.

Bottle things up till you explode
Switch the formula for every person.
Releasing an over processed chemical you call the truth

You mirror others
Pay close attention to them
Learn what kind of person they are
Some call you thoughtful
You are spinning your webs of lies.

The best lie has a bit of the truth
You can’t tell the difference
You end up hurting those you love.
In turn hurt yourself to make it equal
That just hurts them back

It is an endless cycle of torture
You are your hell.

When someone confronts you
You rage.
Scream at them for seeing the true you
Tell them about all the things you have done for them-
How much you have helped them
Careful to cut out the ugly parts
Others back you up
They haven’t met the true you.

You are a double edged sword
Both the sweetest drink-
And most toxic poison.

You would never choose yourself
You always knew people would leave
You hurt them too much
You still wish they stayed.

She hides her hands in her baggy sleeves.
Her hands are too dangerous to be seen.

She has done unspeakable things with them.
To herself,
To others.

Her hands are agents of pain
Whether it’s landing a punch on a friend’s arm for stepping behind her back,
Paying for something she insisted was hers to cover.

Or the choke hold she has on a razor, tracing her skin in red ink,
A suicide note that will never be read.

Each action wounds, yet both hurt others more than they hurt her.

Her friends are upset for she has hit them too hard
Their kindness met with violence.
They only wanted to help,
Yet her hands betrayed her again.

When they see what marks she made on herself,
They cry because they know they can’t stop her.
They plead but her hands don’t listen.

She offers empty words in return .
“I am sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

The truth hangs in the air, unspoken, following her like a storm.
Did she not mean it?
Or is she just using apologies like bandages,
Covering the wounds she inflicts pretending they heal?

She says she’s sorry for hurting herself.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you,”
The lie escapes her lips.
She is not sorry.
She does not regret the way her skin feels warm beneath the sting

You warm yourself by wearing a borrowed sweater
She warms herself with the edge of a stolen blade.

She hides her hands in her sleeves,
Not to protect herself,
To shield others from the horror of what her hands can do.
They are not innocent—they never were.

She hides her hands so you won’t be scared of her,
Most of all, so she won’t have to face them either.