If I bled out in front of you
would you finally see the goodness in me?
What will it take to resurrect the person I am inside from the hollows of your eyes?
I'm suffocating at the pressure of you obligatory love
confined by propriety and severed from my spirit
Cant you see my fingers turning blue?
Cant you hear my desperate gasps?
These tortured lungs’ salvation lies in one breath of forgiveness, slipping past the secure border of your heart
Ducking the spotlights of your anxious ego,
Sprinting over no man’s land through lead hail
Aching for but one glimpse of absolution
And we carve bloody messages in pathetic pantomime
like prisoners reciting from a script
"I love you"
"I'm listening"
"you matter"
But the daggers edge holds no healing touch for soft skins lacerated lament
We share naught but wounds
and the pooling blood beneath us reaches up to define the depravity of all we lack
bleeding out
suffocating
exchanging platitudes at the breakfast table
These plastered smiles worn like armor
with the exhausting weight to match.