He says, show me
and I do
unraveling in the blue light
a ghost draped in satin
half-girl, half-performance
But I don’t think he wants to see me
Not the girl who flinches at her own reflection
not the one who writes love like an elegy
He wants the illusion
the one who knows where to place her hands
and how to make her voice sound like velvet
He says, bare
I wish he meant his soul
Instead I offer skin
pretend it’s enough
pretend I don’t crave the slow confession of his heart
stripped down to its bones
I touch myself to the thought of him
miles away
a mirage stitched into my pulse
Every moan feels like prayer and punishment
Every breath, a plea for reality
He glitters in my mind,
clear as a million gemstones
every one of them sharp
They cut me open
and spell his name in the wounds
Sometimes I think I’m both the stage and the act
He gets the sequined girl who knows her lines
the one who keeps the lights burning
so he doesn’t see the cracks
But I know the truth
underneath the costume
I’m just a girl asking
would you still want my chest
if my heart was cut out of it?
Would you love me
if there was no show to see?
When the call ends
the applause never comes
Just the soft hum of distance
and me
still performing
alone in the dark
wondering if I’ve ever been real
to anyone at all