I am most afraid of a quiet revelation.
Not thunder, not betrayal, not some grand collapse,
but the soft, merciless clarity
of you seeing me
the way I see myself
when the world goes still enough
for the truth to speak.
Not the man who builds,
who carries,
who bleeds himself into structure and safety,
but the fracture beneath it.
The misaligned beams.
The rot I swear I’ve sealed
with calloused hands and practiced smiles.
I fear the moment my reflection
escapes the mirror
and finds its way into your eyes.
That you’ll notice the cracks
aren’t character.
They’re failures!
That the weight I wear like armor
is just proof
I was never strong enough
to set it down.
Because I know what lives in me
when no one is watching.
The quiet arithmetic of not enough.
The tally of every almost,
every should-have-been,
every love I’ve measured
and found myself unworthy of holding.
And if you see that.
Really see it.
How could you possibly
want to stay?
How could you choose a man
who is always bracing for impact?
Who loves like a confession,
like he’s asking forgiveness
for existing inside your life?
I would not blame you
for walking away from the truth of me.
That is the cruelest part.
I understand the leaving
better than I understand the staying.
So I will keep building,
keep bracing,
keep pretending the foundation doesn’t tremble
when I stand too still.
Because losing you
to honesty
would prove what I’ve always known.
That love cannot live
in a place I’ve already condemned.