Familiar
It’s a strange thing, this loneliness.
It isn’t a feeling, it’s an ocean:
crashing, pulling, consuming
I touch the ground, but cannot stay.
I scrabble for a foothold, but I am swept away
by a room full of people
who look at me, but won’t see me.
They see my weight – they see my whiteness –
Why do these decide my worth?
You make me want to peel off my skin
to show you that my heart is beating.
I am breathing. I am bleeding.
I am fighting through fear in faith
to plant my feet, to stretch out my hand.
But the stares, the gossip, the silence on your face
push down my teetering hope into the sand
and back to the sea, whose burdened waves
have now become painfully familiar.
