— Under my skin, I’ll give you something to hold— all my disasters pressed into your hands. Too deep now, but it’s okay. Don’t be afraid.

Pretending to be awake, an out-of-tune voice sighs another excuse. Maybe misfortune finally caught up to me. A reason? No. I don’t need a reason.

My paper heart keeps bleeding, a bitterness repeating, repeating.

There’s no way to live like this: a plastic cutout likeness, a staged imitation. So I suffer here in silence.

So many delusions. Every time I cry, it’s about you. Every time I laugh, it’s for you.

I’m just a stubborn, stained idea. They make art from love, but never for me.

I’d trade myself for loneliness, for awkwardness, for the burned-out feeling of barely being.

For all the better chances you wish you had instead.

For all I never should’ve said. For all I should’ve done. For every stylish trend, every problem you defend.

But eventually, everything meets its ending— even feelings.

There’s nothing left to bleed. I really did believe we spoke the same analogies, but I was trapped somewhere between the real world and a dream.

Maybe we never understood what the words or the facts really were. Maybe they were only repeating themselves again and again,

and somehow still calling it happiness.

Harmony stained with consequences. Maybe then I’ll learn. Maybe all of us will finally learn our lesson.

I said goodbye to repression. I said goodbye to my own words too. I said goodbye to the person I thought I could become.

I’m the unlucky one now. Who saves me from this?

It feels like something above me was laughing, pulling every string while the color drained from the scene.

I smell the lies. I hear the sighs. And I still don’t understand

was it me, or was this never about me at all?