poems for the dead

All Thoughts, No Skin

Love is complicated and painful.

I love halloween, and I've spent it crying for as long as I can remember.

Every year I attempt to plan everything out months before; what I'm dressing up as, who I'm hanging out with, what we're doing.

Every year my plans end up failing. Someone bails, there's a costume malfunction, it rains.

Or it goes perfectly smooth and I still end up crying. My expectations are always too high. I hear of the fun others have and stupidly crave it for myself. 

I'm a very adventurous person, and yet have no adventures to go on. I don't want to go solo, and no one wants to go with me. I don't function very well on my own, yet that seems to be my constant state.

Though I'm not perfect, I am a relatively tame teenager. I don't drink, I don't go out most nights, I don't vape, I don't do drugs, I don't go to parties, I certainly am not going to end up pregnant. I don't necessarily adhere to all these on purpose. I mean, I don't want to get pregnant or vape or do hard drugs. 

Still, I wish my life was more exciting. Most of my time is spent doing homework, sleeping, watching TV, or scrolling through tiktok. Human interaction is something I severly lack. People have fun without me because I'm annoying, or because my crippling anxiety keeps me from talking to them.

I don't want to make bad decisions necessarily, but I feel like I'm missing out on crucial teenage moments. I want to be stupid while I can. I feel childish and simultaneously too mature.

She doesn't really deserve it, but I blame my mom. I blame her for raising me wrong, for raising me to be unlikable, out of touch from my peers. It's not her fault but blaming her is easier than the alternative.

I've dated before. It's never gone right. The trend seems to be people realizing their feelings were never actually real. Even with situationships, especially with situationships. Feelings I once had for one never really went away. They linger and cling to my flesh like a virus. They just keep infecting me worse and worse. I feed the flame and then expect it to go out.

What's worse is I know that this person will never return them. They are too cool, too real. They actually experience life and have friends. It's a mix between obsession and jealousy that makes me stalk their socials. Despite the pain, I love seeing them. They allow me to pretend for a moment like I'm normal, that people like me. And I see them post with their friends doing dumb shit and hear about them getting high or drunk and I yearn to switch places.

Eveyone likes them. They are kind, they listen, they're funny, they're attractive. But most important, they're confident. I have never been confident and it shows. Most days I don't even feel real. If no one sees you, do you even exist? I feel more like a puppet than a person. I feel like I'm a void cosplaying as a person and people notice the blurs at my edges.

What I mean to say is that love has never been kind to me, and I don't even know if I deserve for it to be.