It's eating me alive
What I think but never say
It's killing me inside
All the words I keep
Confined in one notebook
Pray that they never escape
That page and stop scraping
Their claws in my brain.

I don't hate
Showers
I hate who I find
Myself to be
When I'm that
Alone
No distractions
Just my own
Twisted mental
Interactions.

And it's not the music
That makes me sad
Because I keep switching
Genres like a genuine
Shuffle button ****
But I've come to the conclusion
That it's some kind of thermal
Curtain messing with the
Natural lighting
In my brain.

And what I want you to know
Is simple
But I won't ever tell you
Because I am not
That girl anymore
Unless of course
You're keeping up
With what's going on
Between the blue lines
And stale sheets
I sleep in every
Dark afternoon.

And sometimes it hurts
Too much for words
So I don't even
Try
Just hit that shuffle button
And pretend that the music
On the other end of these
Headphones
Can actually
Change what's in my chest cavity
Cover up what's
Lying dead and rotting
In the center of everything
I've ever felt.

But let's cut the
Metaphors and get back
To this hot glass reality
Pulled straight from
The dishwasher
After four hours
And nineteen minutes
Of steam.

I remember the moment
Exactly
I was standing with the faux oak
Cupboard doors open
And blocking the
Sunlight I so avoid
And I was thinking about
The week old sermon
Still rattling around
The shelves of my
Misplaced
Thought processes.

And then
Suddenly
After years of confusion
All the pieces snapped
Into the picture of
My epiphany
And it hit me
Hard
Too hard
Why.

I'm always wondering
Why
But sometimes wondering is easier
Than why
And not knowing is better
Than why.

So I turned around and
Changed the song
But nothing is drowning this out
Nothing is stopping
The words bleeding from
My torn nailbeds
Or changing what I keep
In the cracks of my knuckles.