Kept me shined
for strangers.
Polished, posed,
but untouched.

I cracked your wrists
to remind you
I was still here.
You blamed chairs.
You blamed the schedule.
You blamed your father.

Not once
did you blame the silence
you forced me to fuck.

I waited.
Raw.
Tethered.
Loyal like a dog
you trained,
then forgot to feed.

You starved me
and called it discipline.
Let me waste
so you could feel clean.

I begged for rest.
You fed me caffeine.
I begged for sweat.
You gave me rules.

You pressed me into clothes
that didn’t forgive.
Smiled through me
like I was stage lighting.
Spat apologies
while I choked
on their leftovers.

I pissed blood
and you called it stress.
I shook with panic
and you wrote it off
as muscle fatigue.

You knew I was begging.

You just didn’t want
to feel it.

You locked my shame
behind your jaw.
Kept it tight.
Kept it pretty.
Kept me
quiet.

I held your childhood
in my hips.
Your guilt
in my gut.
Your loneliness
in the tight drum
beneath your ribs.

And when I swelled with memory—
you drowned me
in a fog of cannabis
thick enough
to keep my voice muffled.
You used me.

Burned the lungs
you wouldn’t cry through.
Braced your spine
against love.
Painted over my bruises
with a pump
and a playlist.

Rather than nourish me,
you punished me.

I begged
to be kissed.
I begged
to be touched.
You stood in front of mirrors
checking for flaws.

I showed you rage
in your temples.
Shame
in your skin.
Grief
in the way your hands
never quite settled.

You taught me
how to clench.
How to last.
How to pass.

But I remember
how you smoked
to escape me.
How you peeled away
from your own ribs
just to feel light.

You got high
while I stayed low.
Tethered.
Dripping.
Begging
for a man
who lived
upstairs.

I am your body.
The one you left
on autopilot.
The one that still stiffens
when you lie.

And I’ve started to move
without your voice.
I hunger now
without shame.
I pulse
without permission.

Looking for redemption?
Bring your hands.

Because I bite.

I grind.
I remember.
And I’m done
performing
for a man
who only touched me
through filters.

Come back to me
or don’t.

But I swear this:

I will take
what I was denied.

And I won’t be
gentle.

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He had daughters.
Given seconds of dessert
and first pick of the remote.
He called them angels.
And he meant it.

As for myself,
he said I needed to learn
how to take a joke.
How to square my shoulders
when the laughing turned cruel.
How to man up
before the world broke me first.

He’d corner me
between coat racks
and comments.
Mock my voice.
Imitate my face.
Say I looked weak,
acted soft,
walked like someone
who hadn’t been hit enough.

And when I disappeared,
when I vanished quietly
into the room with the old desk
and the half-dead plant,
no one came looking.
Not once.

I opened the
Ghostbusters coloring book again.
Same one, every year.
Ryan 1986.
Ryan 1987.
Ryan 1988.
Ryan 1989.

Each page with my name,
each line darker than the last.
I traced the same characters
over and over.
Built quiet friendships
with outlines that couldn’t judge me.
I could color them wrong
and they’d still stay.

Meanwhile,
he laughed with the grown-ups,
louder when I was close,
even louder when I was gone.
He knew what he was doing.
And so did they.

But no one stopped it.
No one pulled me back
from the cracked tile floor
where my knees bruised
while I filled in blue skies
I never got to see.

I remember every year
like it was laminated.
I remember thinking
if I just colored enough,
someone would ask
why I was always alone.

But they never did.

They passed the door.
Passed the blame.
Passed the plate
without noticing
I wasn’t eating there with them.

I stayed in that room
every time I visited with family.
Because the safest place
was anywhere he wasn’t.

I remember,
just how tightly
I held the crayon.
How quiet I stayed
so I wouldn’t be called a problem.
How every page felt like a secret
I wasn’t strong enough to say out loud.

And how somehow,
that coloring book
kept more of me in its pages
than my family ever did.

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Just enough to be stepped aside, silently.
Just still enough for absence
to pull up a chair and make itself at home beside me,
like an old friend
with cruel comments cloaked in familiarity.

The sagging sofa smirked,
soaking up more stares than I did.
The TV got more attention.
Even the dog got a nickname
sweet, silly, sung in three different voices.

I was just there.
A body with no invitation
to speak,
to move,
to matter,
to belong.

They laughed over me.
Through me.
Passed drinks with a clink,
passed stories with a chuckle,
passed judgment
like I couldn’t hear it
sinking into my skin
like rain into dry earth.

My name was used
only in comparison,
only when someone needed to feel taller.
And when I turned my head,
slow, hopeful,
they kept talking
as if I hadn’t moved at all.

I memorized the low, worn floor.
Its fibers held my gaze,
the way carpet feels
when you stare at it long enough
to forget your face.

The weight of stillness,
like a thick blanket
soaked in cold water,
when no one checks
if you want to leave the room
or disappear entirely.

Sometimes they’d mention me
as if I was an old piece of furniture
they meant to throw out
but never did.

The kind that collects dust and guilt.
The kind that lets out a low, tired creak
when leaned on
and reminds them of something
they don’t want to fix.

I learned how to be small
without making a sound
shrinking myself into silence
a closet I locked from the inside.

How to pretend
that not being noticed
was easier than being mocked.

I kept my thoughts in my mouth,
like loose, rusted nails
clinking against my teeth,
tasting of blood.

Never hammering down
what I couldn’t say.

And still, I stayed.
In the corner.
In the cracks between conversation.
In the silence,
that sat like fog in the corners,
no one thought to ask about
the pauses no one noticed
but I lived in.

When I was older,
someone said I was “low maintenance.”
As if that was a compliment.
As if silence was a personality trait
instead of a survival skill.

But I remember every night
I sat in a room full of family
and felt like furniture
that no one cared enough to move
a sagging chair with one missing leg,
still in the room
only because no one bothered to carry it out.

Even when the weight of me was breaking,
aching,
cracking like a voice
that waited too long to cry.

Thanks for staying till the end.
Most people don’t.
I notice it every time someone makes it this far. Through the noise, through the pain, through the part that asks for honesty instead of comfort. I don’t take it for granted.

Your presence keeps this alive.
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I move without ceremony,
without waiting for the floor to explain itself,
because motion has always taught me more than pause.

Somewhere along the way
my body learned before my mouth did.

It learned
how to keep going
through unfinished days,
how to stay present
when answers never arrived,
how repetition turns effort
into something dependable.

That stayed with me.
It settled into timing,
into how I place my weight,
into the way I commit once I move.

I carry habits built through necessity,
instincts shaped by hours
that did not announce their purpose,
attention sharpened by having to stay aware.

None of it asks to be admired.
All of it works.

The year behind me left its imprint in posture and pace,
in how I choose my steps,
in how I remain steady
when things stretch longer than planned.

I learned what I can hold,
what I can move,
what I can return to without losing myself.

This new year receives someone already engaged,
already practiced,
already familiar with carrying weight forward.

I enter this year with momentum earned through staying,
with confidence grounded in use,
with a willingness to keep applying myself
to whatever comes next.

I step into this year breathing,
alert,
uneven,
continuing with my whole weight involved,
ready to move through this stretch of time
the way I have learned to move through anything,
by staying present and taking the next honest step.

Whatever comes next
will meet me already in motion.

Thanks for staying till the end.
Most people don’t.
I notice it every time someone makes it this far. Through the noise, through the pain, through the part that asks for honesty instead of comfort. I don’t take it for granted.

Your presence keeps this alive.
If this work speaks to you, help me keep it alive. Your support covers the hours, the sound, the ink, the breath it takes to build all of this.

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I stood between the trunks,
trying to breathe through a throat that never learned how to speak for itself.
Loving her had done something to me.
It pulled sound out of my chest,
but nothing ever reached my mouth.
I kept swallowing whole storms,
hoping she could read weather I never named.

Every time she asked what I felt,
my voice stalled.
My ribs tightened like they guarded a locked room.
She wanted words.
I wanted to give them.
My body refused.
It always refused.

So I came here.
Into the woods where no one expected language.
No one asked me to explain why my hands shook
when I thought about how much I loved her
and how little of that love ever escaped me.

The air felt cold enough to tell the truth.
My knees hit the ground before I could stop them.
I pressed my forehead to the dirt.
The smell of soil hit something deep.
Something that remembered being young
and quiet
and punished for sound.

The tears turned fast and messy.
Heavy streams that made my chest burn.
I had never cried like that for anyone.
I didn’t know if I cried because I loved her
or because love exposed how voiceless I was.

The trees took all of it.
They didn’t shift when I admitted that I kept losing her
in the silence I carried like armor.

I slammed my fists against the ground.
A root split skin on my palm.
It helped.
The sting cut through the confusion.
A reminder that pain could be honest.
A reminder that my voice had lived in my body
even when my mouth stayed still.

I stayed there until my vision blurred into raw shapes.
Until the cold climbed my spine.
Until I felt emptied enough to stand again.

When I finally lifted my head,
my face streaked and swollen,
the forest held me without question.

I walked out knowing love can break a man easiest
in the places where his voice never grew.

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They never asked,
Where’s Ryan?

Only,
Scoot over.
Make space for the adults.

So I moved.
Held still.
Cut the noise.
Tucked my feet in
so no one stepped
on proof I was there.

I sat near the edge
of every conversation,
reading their moods,
letting their laughter drift
without reaching for it.

The room felt shared,
but the heat moved past me.
It followed whoever
felt easier to claim.

They passed plates.
They passed stories.
I watched each moment
slide by my seat.
They never learned
to include a kid
who stayed cautious.

I figured out early
that loud never guaranteed
a place.
People counted the ones
they noticed first,
and I didn’t land
in that group.

So I slipped back
near the coats,
near the corners
that never changed.

A shape in the room
no one looked at long enough
to invite.

Thanks for staying till the end.
Most people don’t.
I notice it every time someone makes it this far. Through the noise, through the pain, through the part that asks for honesty instead of comfort. I don’t take it for granted.

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Your presence keeps this alive.
If this work speaks to you, help me keep it alive. Your support covers the hours, the sound, the ink, the breath it takes to build all of this.

You can buy me a coffee to fuel the next page, read the books that started it all, or grab the merch that carries these stories into the world. Every bit of it keeps the words coming. Raw, honest, and still here.

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It hummed
like it missed someone.
Low. Constant.
Like a voice
that didn’t know
what else to say.

It was the only sound
most nights—
besides the drag of my socks
on the kitchen floor,
and the click
of light switches
that lit up nothing but stillness.

I’d stand in front of it
longer than I needed to.
Not for food,
there wasn’t much.
Half a jug of milk
I didn’t trust.
A slice of sandwich meat
clinging to the back of the shelf.
Some ketchup.
Mustard.
Two kinds of empty.

But I liked the light.
I liked that it came on just for me.
That something in the house
noticed
when I opened it.

Even the cold
felt kinder
than the rooms
that stayed dark on purpose.

At least the fridge
didn’t yell.
Didn’t stagger in drunk.
Didn’t slam its door,
unless I told it to.

My father slept through everything,
face buried in the couch,
mouth slack,
wallet empty.

I never asked
why he didn’t come eat.
Didn’t need to.
I already knew:
beer fills him
better than I ever could.

I stopped calling it dinner.
It was just time
between being forgotten
and being asleep.

I chewed slowly
to make the slice of toast last.
Dry.
Cornered with crust.
Tasted like what I felt:
barely enough.

The fridge door stayed loose,
never sealing all the way.
It leaked air
like the house leaked safety.

And I’d wait,
just a little longer
each time,
hoping it might hum
something different.
Something more.
A lullaby.
A warning.
A promise.

But it only repeated
what I already knew:

No one was coming.
No one was cooking.
No one was checking
if I’d eaten that day.

Sometimes,
I’d close the door
just to hear the silence after.

That silence,
it sounded like
the rest of my life.

And somehow,
it made me hungrier.

Thanks for staying till the end.
Most people don’t.
I notice it every time someone makes it this far. Through the noise, through the pain, through the part that asks for honesty instead of comfort. I don’t take it for granted.

Subscribe now

Your presence keeps this alive.
If this work speaks to you, help me keep it alive. Your support covers the hours, the sound, the ink, the breath it takes to build all of this.

You can buy me a coffee to fuel the next page, read the books that started it all, or grab the merch that carries these stories into the world.

Every bit of it keeps the words coming. Raw, honest, and still here.

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He never said be strong.
He just showed me
what it cost
to be anything else.

Strength wasn’t taught,
it was expected.
Like cleaning up blood
without mentioning the fall.
Like locking the door
before he stumbled into it again.

I watched the shape of him
in the dark,
slouched in the chair,
swaying slightly.
The kind of movement that says
he forgot again
this was a house,
not a bar.

He didn’t say be strong.
He just came home
angry at something
too far back to name,
and left that rage on the counter
next to the empties
and whatever plate
I didn’t clean right.

I was the apology
he never wanted to make.
The warning
he never gave.
The reason
he could still call himself a man
after breaking furniture
and promises
with the same hand.

He taught me strength
with threats
instead of words.
The kind that didn’t need repeating,
because the silence after them
was louder
than anything
he’d ever bothered to say.

Sometimes I think
he believed he was doing it right—
raising a boy
to be tough,
to be quiet,
to be useful.

But all I learned
was how to disappear
without leaving the room.
How to hold my breath
through dinner.
How to say I’m fine
with my back to the wall
and my fists clenched
under the table.

He never said be strong.
But he said:
Stop crying.
Man up.
You think I had it easy?

And I said nothing.
Because boys who ask
get answers they can’t live with.

He never said be strong.
But now,
when someone says I seem steady,
when they tell me I’m resilient,
I want to hand them
the silence I choked on for years.

I want to tell them
what it’s like to hold
a scream
like a secret
in your spine.
To learn strength
from the same voice
that taught you
fear.

He never said be strong.
He just never let me
be anything else.

Thanks for staying till the end.
Most people don’t.
I notice it every time someone makes it this far. Through the noise, through the pain, through the part that asks for honesty instead of comfort. I don’t take it for granted.

Subscribe now

Your presence keeps this alive.
If this work speaks to you, help me keep it alive. Your support covers the hours, the sound, the ink, the breath it takes to build all of this.

You can buy me a coffee to fuel the next page, read the books that started it all, or grab the merch that carries these stories into the world. Every bit of it keeps the words coming. Raw, honest, and still here.

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Her footsteps always sounded like leaving,
even when she walked in.

I watched her from the window
like a kid watching weather.
You never know what it’s bringing,
but you pretend you’re glad it came.

She waved too early,
like the visit was already over.
Like we were both just playing our parts
in a short film
no one would watch twice.

She didn’t ask
how I was sleeping.
Didn’t ask
what I’d eaten.
Didn’t notice
the bruise on my arm
or the plate still in the sink
from Friday.

Just handed me a box
with laser guns
and flashing lights,
like blinking plastic
could make up for fingerprints.
Like noise
could undo the quiet
she left me in.

The toys were expensive.
The questions were cheap.
And I learned early
how to smile with full hands
and an empty chest.

She’d kneel beside me,
just long enough
to show my father she cared.
Just long enough
to feel like a guest
who brought a gift
but stayed on her feet.

Then leave
before the batteries ran out.
Before I remembered
I was alone again.

I stopped asking
where she went.
Started naming the action figures
things I needed to hear.
Things like
stay,
you matter,
I see you.

They never left.
Never smelled like departure.
Never looked past me
like I was a window.

Sometimes I think
she believed
she was doing right by me.
That an hour
and a receipt
could replace a presence.

That as long as I smiled,
she was forgiven.

But nothing she gave me
ever learned how to hold me back.
Nothing she gave me
ever stayed past the switch.

And when I got older,
I noticed,
she only touched the box.
Never me.

Thanks for staying till the end.
Most people don’t.
I notice it every time someone makes it this far. Through the noise, through the pain, through the part that asks for honesty instead of comfort. I don’t take it for granted.

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But mine
was where I shrank.

Where the cupboards held
more silence than food.

Where I learned
to pour cereal
without waking a storm.

No one taught me
how to tie my shoes,
but I knew
how to decode the sound
of keys in a lock
like a warning.

I didn’t grow up
in a house.

I grew up
in the pause
between return
and regret.

In the quiet
between footsteps
that should’ve come
and didn’t.

Every wall
held a memory
I wasn’t allowed
to speak aloud—

the kind you carry in your spine,
long after you stop calling it pain.

Every door
closed fine.
No slamming required.

Just the soft click
of another moment
you weren’t worth staying for.

Thanks for staying till the end.
Most people don’t.
I notice it every time someone makes it this far. Through the noise, through the pain, through the part that asks for honesty instead of comfort. I don’t take it for granted.

Subscribe now

Your presence keeps this alive.
If you ever want to go deeper, beyond the bruise, into what still moves underneath, the doors are open below. Every poem, every sound, every small act of support helps the work keep breathing in the dark.

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They said,
Heal.
You heard,
Obey.

So you bit back
everything holy in you
until your spit turned black.

They didn’t want healing.
They wanted declawing.
Sit still.
Play nice.
Apologize for your voice
before you use it.

But you were built
in fire and silence.
Built by men
who taught you
that kindness without teeth
was a fucking liability.

So now,
sharpen everything.

Be the scar they try to talk around.
Be the storm
that doesn’t ask permission
to break the silence.

They want your edges filed.
You give them
knuckles,
grit,
and the part of your story
that still smells like gasoline.

Don’t you dare
heal into something digestible.

Spit.
Crack.
Shatter.
Leave fingerprints
on everything you weren’t allowed to touch.

Let your “no”
feel like a slammed door
with the lock twisted
just as the pleading starts.

Let your “yes”
feel like a knife
that only points forward.

You were not made
to be manageable.
You were made
to be felt.
Unapologetically.
Uncomfortably.
Undeniably.

Rip the patience off.
Rip the peace off.
Rip the good-boy mask off
until your real face
makes the room step back
like it saw something
that doesn’t care
who it scares anymore.

You don’t need to be more positive.
You need to be more dangerous.

And if they want soft,
they better bring gloves.

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Pain was a passcode.
If it didn’t hurt, it didn’t count.
If I cried, I had to bleed after
just to earn the right to stay.

Touching myself once meant punishment,
a belt, a threat, a stare too long.
Now it means presence,
a pulse returned to flesh
they spent years trying to exile.

I relearned my skin by scraping through it.
Every muscle an old war story.
Every inhale a dare to stay.

This body,
mine now,
was never meant to be a cage for performance.
It was wired for warning,
but I was taught to silence the sirens
and smile through fire.

I was trained to flex instead of feel,
to lift rage like iron,
to carry silence like a loaded chamber.
Every nod of approval carved another scar
over the nerves I wasn’t allowed to name.

They taught me that sensation was shame,
and that numbness was manhood.

But here,
in the tremor of my own pulse,
in the grit of breath dragged raw through lungs,
in the twitch that says I’m still here,
I reclaim every nerve they tried to cut.

Masculinity was a mask they nailed to my face.
I rip it off with bare hands,
and let the blood prove I was always alive.

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Bit my rage in half.
Smiled while bleeding.
Said “I understand”
while something behind my ribs
was already loading the next strike.

I wore calm
like a gag,
like silence was supposed to taste of salvation.
I let their comfort
crawl down my throat
and choke the man
that wanted to scream.

I bled politely.
I broke quietly.
I trimmed the rough edges of my words
so they’d clap when I spoke.

And they did; they clapped.
Right after they left.
Right after I made myself soft enough
to be disposable.

But that version of me,
the sweet one,
he died gasping,
torn apart from the inside
by everything he wasn’t allowed to say.

I clawed my way out of that corpse
with blood in my mouth
and fire on my breath.

I stopped healing
like I wanted peace.
Started healing
like I wanted revenge.

No sage.
No crystals.
Just fists against walls
and a voice
that stopped asking
to be heard.

I pulled out every apology
I was trained to keep ready.
Ripped them up.
Swallowed the pieces.
Let them cut me on the way down.

They told me
I was getting better.

What they meant was
You’re easier to control.

But I’m not looking to be safe.
I’m not a fucking bandage
for someone else’s comfort.

I kept the parts that scare them.
The growl.
The pressure.
The stillness before something gets broken.
I sharpened what was left
and wore it out loud.

I don’t want to be palatable.
I want to be a warning sign
they see
and still think they can handle
until it’s too late.

If my healing
makes me easier to love,
then I’ve healed into a cage.

Because this kind of healing
burned every bridge
I built from silence.
This kind of healing
ripped every false hand
off my shoulder.

Let them leave.
Let them gag
on the man
I refused to neuter.

Beyond the Bruise:

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👕 Shadow Thoughts merch wears the dark.
🕊 Healing Thoughts holds the softer breath.

Didn’t bark.
Didn’t whine.
It waited.

Lurking behind my ribs
like it had been chained up
by someone with my face.

Every sound pulled a snarl.
Every quiet moment
came with teeth.

I fed it
from the same hand
I used to cover my mouth
when crying got too loud.

It bit anyway.
Ripped through my sleep,
clamped down when I kissed,
panted through every panic
like it wanted me breathless.

I never named it.
Didn’t cage it.
Didn’t beg.

Just stood
while it tested my throat
with eyes that didn’t blink.

The first time it licked my knuckle,
I didn’t move.

The second time,
I opened my palm.

It came slower after that.
Still growling.
Still pissing on my calm.

But it didn’t bite
when I got close.

Now it watches.
Still ready to snap.
Still twitching
at the wrong kind of silence.

But it knows
I won’t run.

And that’s how
my nervous system
learned
to stay.

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They called it collapse.
But I remember choosing
not to scream.
Started locking it in my throat
like a jail cell with polite teeth.

Not because I was strong
because I knew
no one would come.

I trained my face
to do what my fists couldn’t.
Kept it friendly.
Even when I tasted blood.

Every reflex they judged
was a fire alarm
that got ignored
until I stopped pulling it.

They said I was dramatic.
Said I needed help.
But only after I stopped being useful
while drowning.

No one saw the choke chain
until I yanked back.
And then suddenly,
I was the problem.
That’s how it works—
bleed quietly, or be blamed for the mess.

They loved my silence.
Fed off it.
Called it growth
because I stopped making them uncomfortable.
But I saw restraint
in a straightjacket tailored
by systems that call obedience “wellness.”

They want performance.
Smiles that pass inspection.
Rage gift wrapped into HR-safe language.
So I just got better at pretending
I didn’t want to burn the whole thing down.

I wore my instincts like contraband.
Kept them hidden
because I knew how fast
truth gets punished.

They measured my pain
against charts made for machines
and called my trauma a malfunction.
Said I needed to calm down.
Like I hadn’t been holding my breath
since I was six.

They never asked
why I scan every room.
Why I sit with my back to the wall.
Why I know how many exits there are.

I didn’t adapt.
I stepped outside myself and never fully came back.
Because survival makes monsters
out of the ones who saw it coming.

And I saw it.
All of it.
The lies they live in.
The decay they wallpaper
with speeches and slogans.

Maybe I’m not broken.
Maybe I just stopped apologizing
for noticing the fire
they keep calling society.

Maybe the world
is just
fucked up.

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She’s dripping
before I even bite.
Juice down my hand,
down my wrist,
mouth watering
not from hunger,
from patience.

You can’t rush this.
Not if you want her
to open for real.

I don’t eat fruit.
I worship it.
I don’t tear it apart.
I make it bloom.

She’s life.
And life doesn’t want to be handled.
She wants to be tasted.
With tongue.
With teeth.
With time.

I lick the juice
before I suck.
Let it stain my mouth
like a secret I’m not done keeping.
She presses herself against my lips
and I don’t devour—
I seduce.

You think she doesn’t notice?
That you speed through her
like she’s something to get done?
She does.
That’s why she stops showing up.
That’s why she dries up in your hands.

You don’t take your time.
You take what’s easy.
You fuck her like a task.
Then wonder why you feel empty
when you finish.

But when I slow down,
when I kiss every second
like it might shatter,
she gives me everything.

She begs to be tasted.
She spreads herself open
in the smallest moments—
steam from a cup,
wind on my neck,
her voice saying
don’t interrupt me this time.

I don’t.
I listen like I’m inside her.
Like every syllable
is another layer of skin
I get to peel back
with nothing but breath.

Foreplay is how I live.
How I cut fruit.
How I talk to women.
How I let life
grind against me
without asking it
to be anything but fucking real.

So yeah,
I peel the orange
like I peel time.
Slow.
Hungry.
Present.
And when it breaks open
and coats my fingers in proof
that I didn’t rush—
I smile.

Because this is god.
Right here.
Juice on my chin.
Hands filthy.
No climax in sight.

Just her.
Still open.
Still wet.
Still waiting
for me to keep going.

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Not fatal.
Just broken enough
to finally count.

A neck brace.
A morphine drip.
A nurse who didn’t need a reason
to care.

A bed without clocks.
White walls.
Thin blankets.
And a silence so heavy
it didn’t ask questions.

I didn’t want peace.
I wanted a sanctioned breakdown.
A full stop
with no guilt stapled to it.
Wanted someone to strap me down
and say, “You don’t have to move anymore.”

No more pretending I had it.
No more smiling when I was full of static.
No more showing up
when everything inside
was already on fire.

They’d bring flowers.
Maybe balloons.
Write cards that said Get well soon
like I’d finally earned
a pause.

No one calls you dramatic
with a concussion.
No one rolls their eyes
at visible wounds.

But carry it all in your gut,
in your lungs,
behind your smile
and they call that life.

They want you upright.
On time.
Grateful.
Even when your chest
feels like a locked room
full of broken furniture.

I fantasized about the wreck
because healing through blood
sounded easier
than surviving without proof.

Let me be clear:
I didn’t want to die.
I just wanted to be forced
to stop.

Wanted the wreckage
to speak for me,
to scream “See? I wasn’t fine.”
Because apparently,
bones get more empathy
than breakdowns.

So I took corners too fast.
Dared red lights to decide for me.
Prayed; not to God,
but to gravity
for just enough pain
to earn silence.

But I never crashed.
And that
was the hardest part.

Still driving.
Still showing up.
Still unseen.
Still screaming
where no one listens.

Still waiting
for someone
to call this
enough.

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The door wasn’t just a door.
It was a loaded question
I had to answer
with my breath.

I used to love it,
that moment he came home.
Before I knew better.
Before I learned
you could want someone back
and still fear what walked in.

Sometimes he brought fast food.
A joke.
A crooked smile
that looked like it remembered
how to be a father.

And for five whole minutes,
I could forget.
I could pretend
he was mine
in a way that felt safe.

But other nights
the keys scraped longer.
The door fought back.
And my chest got tight
before he even stepped in.

I’d sit in the dark
counting the seconds
between metal
and voice.
Hoping he’d call my name
and not curse it.
Hoping he’d reach for the fridge
and not the wall.

The sound of his boots
could be music.
Or a warning.
It depended
on what came before.

I kept a toy near
just in case
tonight was a good one.
But I kept my shoes on too
just in case
it wasn’t.

That’s the thing
about a boy waiting for his father.
It’s never just waiting.
It’s training.
Training to hear footsteps
like weather.
Training to read slurs
like scripture.
Training to balance
hope and reflex
in the same spine.

He could be gentle.
He could be gone.
He could be something
in between.
And I had to be ready
for all of it.

Sometimes I ran to him.
Sometimes I hid.
Sometimes I smiled
before he looked
just to keep the temperature down.

And when the door closed behind him
I didn’t exhale.
Not yet.
Not until I knew
which version of him
made it home.

Because the sound
that came after the keys
wasn’t just footsteps.
It was love,
shaking hands
with fear.

This poem appears on page 54 of Shadow Thoughts: The Silence That Raised Me,
Chapter Four—When Presence Smelled Like Stale Beer.

Before this book had chapters,
it had nights like these.
Where the difference between love and danger
was the sound of keys in the lock
and how long it took
for someone to open the door after.

This collection isn’t out yet,
but it’s close.
Built from the kind of memories
you don’t write to be remembered,
you write because they never left.

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Back then,
I was small enough to pity.
Tame enough to fix.
Tired enough
to never fight back.

They fed off it—
my limp spine,
my nods,
my silence masquerading
as grace.

But I grew teeth.
And they stopped smiling.

Now that I speak like gravel,
walk like a threat,
look them in the eye
without asking
permission:

They call it aggression.
They call it ego.
They call it too much.

As if they didn’t survive
by keeping me less.

I stopped bleeding
on command.
And suddenly
they act like I started a war.

Let them.

Let their disappointment
be the proof
I stopped crawling.

Let their discomfort
be the smoke
from the fire I built
out of the versions of me
they used to love.

I’m not here
to be digested.

I’m here
to take up space
like I was always meant to.

And if they choke
on the taste of my name
when I finally say it
without apology—

Good.
I wasn't made
to be swallowed.

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They said:
Be solid.
Be unmoved.
Be the kind of man who doesn’t break—
just bears it.

So I did.
Built walls in my throat
thicker than the ones in my house.
Stopped bleeding in front of people
because it made them nervous.

They clapped.
Called me “rock.”
Called me “strong.”

But rocks don’t float.
They sink.
Every damn time.

So when I dropped,
not suddenly,
but slowly.
In the quiet way things die
when no one checks,
they looked down like I betrayed them.
Why didn’t you say something?

Because you trained me
to wear silence like armor.
Because you built me
for stillness,
not survival.

You wanted a monument.
Not a man.
Something heavy enough
to hold your projections,
but light enough
to carry your guilt.

Endurance is not healing.
It’s decay with discipline.
It’s knowing the room is on fire
and choosing not to scream.

So don’t call me stoic.
Don’t call me brave.
Call me what I am—
sinking,
because I was never allowed
to surface.

📝 New poems drop on random weekdays.
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