It is living that brings forth words
and shapes them into sentences inside my head.
Sometimes they are beautiful,
but usually, they make my palms sweaty
and my chest hurt, as if my lungs
have expanded too large
for my rib cage to contain.

Today, the words
come to me in slow rhythms,
like two lovers waltzing.

I love these days the best,
when I sit at my kitchen table
and gaze outside across the street
while the afternoon sun warms the side
of my body, my head cool and calm.

I twirl a spoon in one hand
absentmindedly,
rest my head on the other hand.

I wish the sparrows would sing
like they usually do,
but today, they seem
to have gotten tired of it.

They are all scattered across the front yard,
little flecks of light brown splashed
in between splotches of grass and cement.
I see one perched on the top
of my mailbox, its head in my direction.
Words sprout out from the fountain inside
my head, and suddenly I am crooning,
Sing, little bird, sing.

I gaze at the sparrow intensely,
urging it to understand. It ***** its head at me
and then flies away in the other direction.

...

The next time I wake, the words flow
angrily.
They stain my head
like splattered ink,
and no matter how vigorously I rub at them,
they are there,
as black as the soles of my shoes.

The sun won’t reach me today, because I refuse
to let it. Living is safer
in my room, where I am shielded
by walls and doors, cocooned
by blankets and shawls.

My mother taps lightly on my door,
begging me to return
to the outside world,
but I keep the bitter sentences
I have formed
from slipping past my lips
and curl tightly against my pillow.

I am done with pretending. I am done with words.
Living would be easier if I could shut them out the same way
I shut everyone else out.

On days like these, I like to imagine
that I have a little hole in my skull,
and when I tilt my head just right,
the words pour out in dark streams.
Then they will be irretrievable,
gone forever like the silence I wish
I could give myself again.