Wallflower

 

Am I really as worthless as I seem?

 Or just a ghost of a half-formed dream?

I see them build their lives with grace,

While I drift quiet, out of place.

They speak in stories, bold and bright,

While I’ve grown used to shrinking light.

They had their chances, carved in stone —

I learned to dream when left alone.

I tried to bloom in secret light,

 But wilted when it came to fight.

 And every step I tried to take

 Felt like a sin I couldn’t make.

Now guilt, like perfume, fills the air,

In half-meant words, in softened care.

They say, “It’s not too late, just start,”

But something aches behind my heart.

Am I punishing them, or just me?

 For who I was, or couldn't be?

 For all the doors that stayed shut tight,

 Or the ones I feared to push with might?

Their pride wraps ‘round their sons like gold,

In tales repeated, fondly told.

But me? I’m quiet — always was —

A gentle hush, a muted pause.

I hold resentment like a flame,

And still, I long to not feel blame.

They call me kind, they call me wise,

 But never with the same bright eyes.

 And though I try to understand,

 It hurts to feel so secondhand.

But maybe they’re not all to blame,

 Perhaps I fed my own small flame.

 Because what do I shine in? What’s my gem?

 I’m shy, I’m scared, I hide, I fall,

 I build no ladders, just walls too tall.

Maybe it’s me — maybe I fall,

 Too soon, too fast, too much, that’s all.

 I chase, then flinch; I open, close;

 And ruin what I need the most.

I sit with pain I’ve never named,

 And let the silence take the blame.

 I wear my silence like a crown

 While watching love just let me down.

A Quiet Mourning

 

Sometimes I feel each choice I make
Is just another small mistake.
Not loud enough to break me down,
But wrong enough to wear a frown.

Might be wrong—I often am,
I turn a whisper to a slam.
A walking wound of self-blame art,
Who overfeels with half a heart.

I second-guess the things I do,

Then blame myself for guessing too.

A thousand thoughts I never share—

They say I’m calm. I’m just not there.

Tried to play it cool, composed,

But deep inside, I’ve never closed.

Care too much, Feel too deep,

And carry secrets I can’t keep.

I take the silence, every glance,

Each word that didn’t stand a chance,

And press them gently to my chest—

Unspoken grief I never rest.

I talk to walls, I talk to smoke,

To all the things I never spoke.

I cry in ways no one can hear—

It’s safer when the world’s not near.

 

And oddly, I take pride in this—
In hiding what they’d never miss.

But truth be told, I’m scared to death,
Of someone catching my raw breath.
To look too close, to see too much,
My soul beneath the skin they touch.

Secrets i carry on my spine,
They ache like ghosts that once were mine.
And every day, I’m close to saying

All the things I’ve been delaying.
But then I stop. I look away.

Paranoid, not in a test,
But just enough to miss some rest.
I think they’re watching, waiting still,
To catch a flaw, to get their fill.

So up go walls, with quiet hands,
Invisible, like shifting sands.
And maybe—maybe—deep inside,
I want someone to push aside.

(Forget I said that. Let it fade.
It’s just a thought I never made.)

Learned to live with less and less—
Few friends, less love, more loneliness.
A family that can’t really see
The buried, side of me.

Each day feels like a soft goodbye
To parts of me I let slip by.
I mourn the words I didn’t say,
The lives I lost along the way.

The love I gave too fast, too strong,
The things I got so deeply wrong.
It’s grief that hums beneath my skin—
A song that’s always played within.

The things I did, the ones I missed,
The chances I let fall through fists.
A heaviness that’s grown so deep,
It tucks me in each night to sleep.

And though it hurts, I let it stay—

This quiet mourning, day by day.

It’s all I’ve known, and so I keep

Its heavy rhythm in my sleep.