I do this thing
where I disappear.
Nothing new. Three times now,
maybe four.

It’s a hobby,
like scrapbooking,
but with my own silence.

The first time,
they said it was hormones.
The second, attention.
Now it’s just
a phase I’m nailing.

I’m very good at it.

Every morning,
a resurrection.
Lipgloss.
Mascara.
Shaky hands. Ta-da.

Can you hear the applause?
Neither can I.

The skin’s still here.
So is the mirror.
And the voice that tells me
not to eat,
not to speak,
not to exist so loudly.

They call me dramatic,
as if pain
needs a spotlight.
As if I don’t bleed
in lowercase letters.

I joke.
I wear band shirts.
I make playlists with
no happy endings.
So aesthetic.

And they love it—
like how I perform survival
like it’s a talent show.
“Such a bright girl.”
“Such potential.”
As if I’m not already
writing my vanishing act
in invisible ink.

There is a kind of power
in being looked at
and not seen.

Do you know how it feels
to scream into a pillow
so well it forgets
how to echo?

I do.

Dying
is an art, too.
But living—
living is the part
I haven’t mastered.

Yet.