Dying In Your Own Skin or The Struggle Isn't As Real As You Think It Is

What happens when you're in love and that mixes with your social anxiety and you're decaying sense of self worth.

If I could get up then I would. Push boulders up steep hills. Marathon around the globe. Get up, move my feet, and dance the time away.

But I'm just sitting. Waiting. Dying in my own skin. Perpetually treading water, hoping not to drown. Self centered eyes shut. Refusing to see that the water's only waist deep.

Rib cages make retaining walls, be it a leak or a flood. And if your heart creeps up through your throat, swallow it back down. Its better to cough then to stumble.

Awkward glances and quick turn away. Mutter a quick joke, a bad one. Mutter a laugh, mutter a weak one. Retreat back to your corners. To safety. Hesitate. Contemplate your next move. Strategize.

You'll never have the nerve. The nerve to go driving at full speed. The nerve to accept the inevitability that in time you'll crash and burn. To accept that they will eventually go up in flames as well �" and that you will have had a hand in it. No. Stay away. Then, at least, your fingerprints won't be on the wheel.

If I could I would get up. But I don't think I can. I don't think I will. I'm frozen here, atrophied. I'm frozen here, dying in my own skin.

Author's Note

I wrote this last night in one sitting. What that means is it raw, unfiltered, and probably shit. I don't usually write poems. I haven't written one in years. However I felt the feelings of social anxiety and loneliness would be best written out as a poem, as compared to a narrative. In short stories one of the characters are essentially me. This IS me. Dramatic? Yes, I know.