can you feel it?
not the kind of heat
that warms
but the kind
that peels.
i walk around like a furnace in a borrowed skin,
smiling like i’m not
a cathedral on fire
with stained glass dreams
melting
down my ribs.
no alarms.
no sirens.
just the crackle of me, pretending
this is fine.
just the sizzle when kindness
touches me too long.
they glance at my eyes,
see the smoke curling quiet in the corners,
and call it a shadow.
say i should sleep more.
say i look “worn out.”
but how do you rest
when your bones are matchsticks
and your thoughts strike them,
over and over,
until even your dreams
start to sweat?
i eat ice just to hear it scream.
drink silence,
but it boils in my throat.
once, i told someone
i feel like a house
that caught fire quietly
from the inside out.
they laughed, said
same.
but i wonder
if they meant it,
or if they were just
lighting a candle
and mistaking it
for hell.
some days i imagine
my heart is a kiln
shaping nothing
but grief.
and still they ask:
“what’s wrong?”
like this isn’t
a slow apocalypse
wearing my clothes.
like my spine isn’t
smoke in formalwear.
like i don’t wake up
with a throat full of embers,
trying to cough up the sun.
tell me—
do you really feel it?
the burn i carry in my smile,
the one that eats polite words
and spits them out as ash?
or do i look
normal
enough
to ignore?
Apr 9, 2025
Apr 9, 2025 at 5:44 PM UTC
can you feel it?
not the kind of heat
that warms
but the kind
that peels.
i walk around like a furnace in a borrowed skin,
smiling like i’m not
a cathedral on fire
with stained glass dreams
melting
down my ribs.
no alarms.
no sirens.
just the crackle of me, pretending
this is fine.
just the sizzle when kindness
touches me too long.
they glance at my eyes,
see the smoke curling quiet in the corners,
and call it a shadow.
say i should sleep more.
say i look “worn out.”
but how do you rest
when your bones are matchsticks
and your thoughts strike them,
over and over,
until even your dreams
start to sweat?
i eat ice just to hear it scream.
drink silence,
but it boils in my throat.
once, i told someone
i feel like a house
that caught fire quietly
from the inside out.
they laughed, said
same.
but i wonder
if they meant it,
or if they were just
lighting a candle
and mistaking it
for hell.
some days i imagine
my heart is a kiln
shaping nothing
but grief.
and still they ask:
“what’s wrong?”
like this isn’t
a slow apocalypse
wearing my clothes.
like my spine isn’t
smoke in formalwear.
like i don’t wake up
with a throat full of embers,
trying to cough up the sun.
tell me—
do you really feel it?
the burn i carry in my smile,
the one that eats polite words
and spits them out as ash?
or do i look
normal
enough
to ignore?