Poem 1

Silently Sad

By: Ashley L Powers

I sit here with frustrated thoughts

My inner fists beating against these walls I’ve built

This is what it must feel like to be in prison

Trapped within the bars of my mind’s cell

I feel like I’m choking, it’s really getting hard to breathe

I truly feel suffocated by the pain

The thoughts, the hurt, flows through me like a ocean

But I can’t swim so I’m drowning

My insides are crumbling

Yet my outside shows no sign of trauma

I let the smile on my face fool everyone

People ask me if I’m okay…

And YES flows from my mouth with ease

But it’s truly taking everything in me not to break down and scream

I want to yell at the top of my lungs…

…HELL NO I’M NOT FINE, HELP ME PLEASE

Why can’t you see that I’m hurting?

I tell myself that no one cares

So I keep everything bottled up

But inside I’m slowly dying

Behind closed doors I’m crying

Waves of emotions that keep pulling me under

Every night that I rest my head

I lay in my own tear filled puddle

But I’m a Pisces so I should be used to it

I just want to be rescued

But there’s no one to save me

I’m fighting myself, trying to stop the tears from falling

My internal dam can’t take all the weight

So it folds under pressure

The cracks I tried to seal are beginning to break

Tears so heavy I can’t focus

But I make sure to wipe them away before you notice

I have to pretend to be perfect

Y’all look at me and see Ashley

I look at me and see half broken…

…heartbroken

I see a woman who’s torn apart from her own confusion

How do I tell the world I’m shattered?

How do I tell the world I feel like I’ve lost everything that mattered?

Until I figure it out

I’ll just keep it to myself

I’ll just keep sitting here staring at these four walls

Suffering….

….dying

Slowing going mad….

….silently sad