A Trick of the Tongue

A poem about being unable to overcome social and personal boundaries.

A Trick of the Tongue

Talk?
I cannot.
Expose my tongue to the world?
I cannot let them see the back of my throat
Or hear my words.
I’m trapped within my own senses,
Thoughts and feelings and the smell of my own fear
Reverbrating against the walls that enclose me.
The sound of another human has not entered the doors of my body
For a long, long time…
Perhaps forever?
I can’t remember.
But it was painful,
Scary,
Terrifying.
Don’t make me leave,
I cannot take the cold world outside.
I cannot walk on the paths that others have created,
I must make my own.
I must breathe air that no others have taken in,
I must hide
For fear of breaking, shattering
In the hard sunlight.
Talk?
I cannot.
Leave?
I cannot.
Breathe?
I need not.
Live?
What does that even mean?