The sun has set, and my side of the world has all fallen into dreams.
I am lying here, naked, a conglomeration of bones with skin pulled taut over them.
I feel as if I am nothing more, and my eyes turn into puddles.
It is at this time that my internal storm arrives.
My pain is without subject, and my tears without provocation –
I guess existing in this world is enough.
My lungs lust for the ability to scream, to shriek until they all notice,
but the feeling is suppressed again and again.

Breaths pushed in and out of my body – I can’t breathe,
I can’t breathe.
Intermission between inhalations shortens, and my knees curl to my chest
as my entire body trembles  under the weight of that which I cannot identify.

“You are sad every night,” he says.
Yes, I am, for the night is when I am forced to spend time with myself.
Lying here, my skin is asking to be clawed off of my body
and hopefully the imperfections will go with it.
Every word I have uttered filters through my mind, and every word is wrong.
With the façade of my successful existence now sprawled out on the floor next to my bed,
I lie on the mattress in emptiness.

The tears come like a flash flood, and I am overcome with anxieties of my inadequacy.
The shaking is my earthquake, an earthquake that is unending.
But, I’m not supposed to be feeling this way again.
I suppose I don’t deserve anything better.