“If I Said Everything”

If I said everything

you’d stop calling me kind.

You’d understand that patience is not peace,

that silence is not grace

but a clenched jaw

and a swallowed scream

with bite marks on the tongue.

If I said everything

you’d hear how much I want to disappear

to be somewhere where nobody will know my name,

where no one needs me

or even wants me to grin when I’m weary

of smiling.

If I said everything,

you would know I replay every flounder

until it becomes a lullaby.

That I measure my worth

in responses, in usefulness,

in whether or not someone texts back.

If I said everything,

you would know that I am scared of being normal,

but I’m tired of being amazing

for people who don’t even notice I’m there.

If I said everything,

you might not love me.

But maybe

maybe you would love me more.

So I write instead.

Because poems don’t flinch.

Because the page

never turns away.