Mute Shame
I write a poem on my phone on the train on my birthday, taking care not to jostle the woman whose hair tickles my hand as I type and delete, type and delete. Overwhelming sensation. Extraordinary sadness. I keep typing and deleting, typing and deleting.
I peel a tiny piece of my heart off and sew it into the poem. It looks ugly—too much blood. I pause, then delete, delete, delete. The little cursor on the screen blinks at a perfect metronome against the now-blank note; there, then not, then there, then not. I get the vague idea of another poem, and I stare at the screen for so long that I forget it. I slip my phone back into my pocket.
For a moment, I wonder if I accidentally deleted that little strip of my heart, but then the train jerks and I bump into a salaryman and everything is put on hold for three seconds so that I can aptly and completely loathe myself. I bite my tongue. Mute shame.
The train jerks twice more as it pulls into the station. I swallow a scream, but this is fine, because I have been swallowing a scream for six years and practice makes perfect. If you look closely, you’ll see hairline fractures in the backs of my eyes; so don’t look closely, okay?
