I’VE BEEN FOLLOWING MY CLASSMATES AROUND CLASSES

like a lost wave trying to find the mother sea / i don’t think i ever made eye contact with their voices in my head / i keep watching the crevices of the ground / the subtle waves of the granite / the swish of a cat’s tail. / i’m at the back as they chatter / i know they love me / so i keep walking behind them / no conversation of my own. / i don’t own any words to say / i keep reactions in my mouth / plastered on my face like a social cue / the sunlight casting my shadow over their fair skins. / i thought silence speaks loudly / they would see the admiration in me / but they / they keep talking. / to me they are the word politesse / my friends hug and share the fries with me / detachment twists in my heart / i cannot find the breath in humidity / and then the demon knocks my breath over. / no effort because you cannot bring yourself to talk? / what a shame. / what if you don’t know about love? / speak yourself, damn you. / they just don’t involve you much because you’re stuck up in the air / ground yourself here, idiot. / don’t you belong here? / i watch the demon eat the ice cream sandwich / and hold its throat in my fingers / i say, you know / even belonging is made up of two words. / be-longing. be-longing. / in belonging, we’re always in the state of longing. / correction, i’m always longing. / on that side of a coin where i’m needed but i’m not necessary for breathing. life / i think this is my sin for not initiating talk / for being too nervous to start talking about anything apart from what i should. / the demon’s throat is melting under the sun / and a little me taps my thigh. / i’m sorry i tell her / i’m sorry that this wretched self of mine cannot make a connection worth / for not being a person worth remembering. / that i can never become that person who can be taken on friendly dates / that i’m back to square one, only that i belong to the world, not its crowd. / not its crowd. / i let my hair open and allow the waters of the tap to entwine with it / i want to be pulled by my strands / i want to be ripped into my bloody senses / my social senses that i lost at age eleven revived / but then i look at the demon in the mirror / and realise this is eternal, here. / my solitude is eternal here. / how do i cut this from my life? / how long will this feeling last? / how long will it be until my own speech suffocates the human within me for good?