I don't remember
when I stopped speaking.

Maybe it was the first time
someone taught me that screaming
only made things worse.

Maybe it was the first hand
that made my body understand
before my mind could.

Maybe it was the first funeral,
when death took someone I loved
and left me standing there
with a mouth full of words
that had nowhere to go.

Or maybe
I have been losing my voice
one piece at a time.

A little with every apology
I didn't owe.

A little with every I'm fine
spoken through clenched teeth.

A little every time
I swallowed the truth
because telling it felt more dangerous
than carrying it.

Now the words live somewhere
deep inside me—

rotting.

Like teeth buried in a grave.
Like flowers left too long
in a vase of black water.

Sometimes I can feel them moving.

A scream scratching
against the inside of my throat.

A thousand things I want to say
clawing at my ribs.

But when I try to speak,

nothing.

Just silence.

Just that familiar suffocating darkness
closing its hands around my throat.

Trauma is cruel like that.

It doesn't need to keep hurting you
when it has already taught your body
to hurt itself for it.

I still wake up
fighting ghosts
that don't know they're dead.

I still flinch at shadows.

Still listen for footsteps
that aren't coming.

Still feel hands
that aren't there.

Still carry memories
like corpses chained to my ankles.

And some days
I wonder if there is anything left of me
beneath all this death.

I don't know
if I will ever find my voice again.

I don't know
if the person who once had it
is still buried somewhere inside me,

or if trauma took her
and left only the shell behind.

I wish I could say
I'm healing.

But some days
I'm not healing.

I'm surviving.

There is a difference.

Some mornings,
survival is getting out of bed
with the dead screaming in my head.

Some nights,
it's convincing myself
to stay until morning.

Sometimes survival
is nothing more than breathing
when breathing feels like betrayal.

I am tired.

Gods, I am so fucking tired.

But I am still here.

Not because I'm fearless.

Not because I've conquered anything.

Not because I know
there is a beautiful ending waiting for me.

I'm here because
some small, stubborn piece of me
refuses to become another ghost.

So I keep searching
through the ruins.

Through the ash.

Through everything they broke.

For a voice
I don't know if I can find.

For a piece of myself
I don't know if I still deserve.

And maybe tomorrow
I'll only manage a whisper.

Maybe tomorrow
I'll say nothing at all.

Maybe all I can do
is breathe.

But for now,

breathing is enough.

For now,

I'm still fighting.

And somewhere beneath
all this silence,

something inside me
is still alive.

I don't know what to call it.

Hope feels too beautiful.

Strength feels like a lie.

Maybe it's just survival.

Maybe it's just the smallest, ugliest little heartbeat
refusing to stop.

Whatever it is,

I'm holding onto it.

Even with bloody hands.

Even in the dark.

Even when I cannot hear my own voice anymore.

Because if there is still something inside me
fighting to survive,

then maybe ~

just maybe ~

I am not gone yet.