Beneath My Tongue

There is a temple in the back of my mouth

where prayers spoil before they reach the air.

I have spoken to no one of these psalms,

not even the wind,

who begs to carry them.

I carry the ache of things unlived,

loves I never let bloom

because I mistook fear for wisdom.

I have smiled at people I wanted to shatter.

I have turned from people I longed to kneel before.

My silence is not virtue.

It is a cloak for the trembling child inside,

the one who still thinks being known is a threat.

Who learned too young

that truth can be used as a blade.

Who decided it was safer to become

the sheath.

If you knew what I never say,

you would see the fire in my soul,

not the calm in my eyes.

You would see

how often I want to scream in public

and say,

“Please, I don’t know how to be human today.”

I have envied the loud,

not for their volume,

but for their freedom.

They bruise and bloom in the same breath.

While I bruise inward,

in the folds of an invisible script

I recite to myself each morning:

Be small. Be nice. Be quiet. Be good.

But tonight

let me speak like a river finally breaking its dam.

Let me say the unshaped things:

That I miss people I shouldn’t.

That I resent the gods I pretend to trust.

That I crave to be held like something holy,

not handled like something useful.

That I am tired of guarding the fragile parts of me

as if softness were shame.

That I want to love and be loved

without rehearsing it first.

And maybe,

maybe none of this will be heard.

But I will have heard myself.

And that

is the beginning.