i don’t stay long enough

i don’t stay long enough to hear the applause

mainly because i feel like i don’t deserve it

i don’t stay long enough to be loved

letters from lost lovers lie strangled in mess of my mind

i don’t dare to open them

for im scared of all the missed love stories

i move through people’s lives like a drift

i don’t like the ways they’ve looked at me.

the ways they’ve perceived me.

i don’t know when i turn transform from a person to a concept

a figment of their ideas.

i run back to my home reducing everything into a metaphor

;

they asked me where do i want to be in the next 5 years

i want to have an exit door

i want a little extra space

i want the little spaces between the boxes to breathe

to flow into

i want to run as i fast i can

i want to breathe in a land beyond the four walls

i want the strength to push these walls when they creep onto me

when every metaphor i write comes crumbling down into the ugly truth it was

when no artistry can aid the blood dripping over the same four walls;

when i can’t separate my breath and smoke anymore

i need the strength.

the power

to stay.

to fight back.

-Avni Jain