READ ALOUD TO YOURSELF
-I feel safe in my awkwardness
That means that I relish the sickness
I hold it close to my heart
Protecting me
I wear it well
A fuzzy mask of sarcasm and cutting remarks
I wear it so well
People don’t see who I am
Or they think I’m someone else
Someone new
Someone different
They see a different version of me
Every time
We all do this
THIS IS NOT NEW
But what is important is that we take this blanket
This mask
Make it visible
Make it glow-in-the-dark
It’s vital to sometimes show who we are
rip it back
tear it off
Like pull apart the curtains at the top of a terrible show
And in that moment
hope that someone will appreciate what we have
the light
the dark
the mercurial
that comes from within and cannot be measured on a scale from 0 – 10
-I’m covered in bruises now
She says
Probably in a lot of pain
But at least we can see where that is
We can diagnose it and stick a label on it
Could you hold out your wrist?
It’s in case you go wandering off
Please stay in your cage please thank you.
This is not how this was supposed to be
People always say it’s never gonna be how you expect it
And they’re right
They were right about you
They tried to tell you about how you’d feel
But you didn’t believe them
The bruises
The black and blue
It’ll never express how you actually feel
They are reading you like a map
But you don’t have any logical routes to follow
It’s more than you think
It’s more than you ever expected
PHILIPPA MANNION 