It hurts sometimes,
the way my tongue presses hard
against the roof of my mouth
attempting to hold back the tears
when someone is watching.
I have emptied my heart
by way of my throat,
silencing the howl lying in wait
to rip up through my eyes
and tell a story not ready to be told.
I close my eyes tight,
hoping it closes the book
where that story waits,
but it only opens the wound wider,
only burns my eyes
with this river waiting to pour.
Biting my lips doesn’t silence
the words that beg to come out
and I tell them,
“You are not ready yet.
Get back in there, dry yourself off,
you smell like pain, you look like a
broken fucking mess. No one wants
to hear the way you are drenched in
my sobs. Get your shit together
or I will never speak of you.”
Those words… they never listen.
They want to be seen as they are.
They want to be filthy and true.
They are always trying to find ways
to escape this hell of me,
trying to find ways to douse the flames
burning my insides…
trying to make me cry like they do.
I take a deep breath, close my eyes,
hoping those words burn
before they gather hands
and tell a story that may be
the death of me.
-Stephanie Bennett-Henry
#stephaniebennetthenry
The word that do escape, here, have their own raw power; pain, yes, and beauty too, “For a’ that, an’ a’ that.” [a slight borrowing from Robert Burns]
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Reblogged this on cabbagesandkings524 and commented:
Stephanie Bennett-Henry – Escaped words
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thats pretty intense i suppose
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