They say when you go through trauma
It either kills you
Or you forget it.
They don't tell you what to do
when the options blend.
There's no hotline to call
when the memories you've buried
claw their way back up your throat
like the pills that didn't work.
I am a causality of a war I never fought in.

I cut my hair short so I can wash it in the sink,
For the days when my shower turns into a tardis I cannot control,
A time machine with only one date.
I have grown sick of not finding refuge in this time and place.
When I shave my head,
I think of how impossible it is to pull a buzzcut.

I write the date on every piece of paper,
But I don't really live here.
The present is just a hideout from the past,
The future a threat of going back.
I am on the run.
A fugitive of broken memories and stolen hope.

I lock each door in my house
five times
before telling my mom goodnight.
I check underneath my bed,
Move the clothes in my closet
until I'm sure I can see every part of the back wall,
and leave its door open.
I bend my eyes into every corner and hollow spot.
I will not go to sleep.
I will dream myself awake.
I wake up in my bathtub time machine,
Raise my face through the surface of the red water,
My long hair wrapping itself around my throat like promises from a time when I still felt alive.
I will probably scream,
And find myself back in my bed.
My family won't hear a thing.