We are the prisoners of the night;

Shrouded in the secrecy of moonlight,

Cause it’s the only thing that protects us

From their penetrating gazes.

Everything yearns to be hidden. Even time itself,

Whose nervous hands slow to a stop

When given attention.

The darkness is our safe place.

Our only camouflage.


We are the prisoners of self-sufficiency;

Liberation without liberty,

Cause our independence is born

From an inability to reach out and say

Help me.

Call it isolation.

It’s nice being alone;

It’s the loneliness that’s scary.

But 

So is intimacy.


We are the prisoners of regret;

Things that should have been done and said

And things that shouldn’t have.

Wounds heal

And scars fade

So why do my faults

Continue to blemish my skin

And reopen on their own whim?

While I’m in the arms of false security

That’s when it strikes.


A painful numbness forms a pit

At the bottom of my gut.

My heart is in my throat

And my pulse, in my ears;

A reminder that I’m still alive

But not living.

Dizziness,

Like the world itself is a carousel;

Bright lights

And the blur of a thousand

Piercing stares

In the illusion of merriment.

I’m scared.


What can’t be seen cannot disappoint,

What can’t be raised cannot fall, and

I can’t lament what hasn’t been done.


We are the prisoners of anxiety.

Hear our plea.

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