invisible curriculum
there are days
i sit inside my own head
like a classroom after the bell.
chairs crooked,
lights still humming,
no one coming back for me
and i ask
what do i want from this life?
the question echoes
like a teacher who already knows
i won’t answer
i used to beg for these days back
hallways, lockers,
the sound of something normal
now i watch them fall apart
in slow motion
period three becomes a ghost
a seat with my name on it
that no one expects to be filled
and they ask me.
do you want a future?
and for a second
the smallest, quickest second.
everything goes quiet
and the truth
slips out of me like breath in winter
no
i am a collection of almosts
almost showing up
almost caring
almost someone worth staying for
they call them mistakes
like they are small things
but they stack
and stack
and stack
until they look like a person
i don’t recognize
so i run
into noise
into people who don’t ask questions
into anything that makes the silence stop
fights that burn out by morning
nights that blur into each other
choices that feel like falling
but slower
and i tell myself
i’m fine with this
because it’s easier
to destroy something
than to fix it
there are days
i don’t leave my bed
the world keeps moving
without asking where i went
and i let it
because caring
feels heavier than disappearing
but the worst part
isn’t the sadness
it’s the feeling i can’t name
not anger
not grief
something colder
like standing in a dark room
knowing something is there
but never seeing it
just feeling it breathe
when you do
i’ve felt it since i was small
back in that house
where safety was a word
no one taught me how to spell
it followed me out
like a shadow that learned my name
and even now
in places that are supposed to be better
it still presses against my ribs
like it belongs there
sometimes
i talk out loud
to no one
to someone
to pieces of myself
that only exist when i’m breaking
and in those moments
truth spills easier
tears come faster
like i finally stop pretending
i’m not the one hurting me
i don’t know how to build a life
no one handed me the instructions
no one showed me
how to hold a future
without dropping it
i learned more from a screen
than from a classroom
and even that
feels like half a language
so i sit here
half taught
half gone
half hoping
wondering
if i’ve already missed the moment
where things were supposed to change
because i’ve been invisible
to myself
for so long
i don’t know
what it would look like
to come back
but sometimes.
quietly,
like a thought i don’t trust
i wonder
if there’s a version of me
still sitting in that empty classroom
waiting
not for a perfect answer
just
for me
to show up.
