My chest deepens as I think of what words to say.

I can not speak.

I am filled with fear, and it scratches at my surface like claws.

This fear comes with the realization that I should speak,

that I want to speak,

that I want to be brave,

but I can not.

 

I may appear brave, but truly I am not.

I am stuck in a blackness of nothing but lost words and lost emotions

all due to the fact that I can not free these demons.

They eat at me, and feed off me.

They lock me in the closet so I remain in the dark and blind.

 

Taking risks is brave.

I have taken a few, but I can’t even speak to my dad,

how can I speak to you.

 

My fingers tingle with anxiety that my compassion is being diminished,

because I can not get over my fears.

What even are my fears?

That is a good question.

 

I find it so easy to minimize and forget all the feelings I may have built up,

all the anger I keep inside,

and all the tears I may hide.

Because being blank and being small I fall less.

And I am afraid of heights,

so my best chance at relieving that fear of climbing up too many stairs,

is to not climb at all.

But if I do that

I am missing the view,

and I have lost.

 

I wanted to say I appreciate

your words

your bravery

your vulnerability

your truth.

 

The truth for me is so deeply hidden under my bed,

where the monsters lay,

I am too afraid to dig it out.

It may be sad, but hear me out,

I am determined to see this eye to eye.

Instead of looking passed it and you and all of those little in betweens,

I am going to look straight into the eyes of it,

and you.

 

I am sick and tired of being scared.

I am sick and tired of letting him drink the night away and me away.

I am sick and tired of hearing those cruel words fill my house with a black smog.

I am sick and tired of not being true.

True to me.