Remember how you used to be afraid of the monsters in your closet?
How you would cower in fear until embraced in your mother’s strong arms
That reminded you of a heated blanket by a fireplace,
Whisking you into an oasis of safety?

Remember how her bed was always cozier,
More comfortable?

Remember the nights she felt braver,
Valiantly chasing the monsters away?
How her arms would transform into a shield,
Unyielding and impenetrable?

And remember that when you started growing older,
The flames that once kept fear at bay began to wane,
And the shield shows signs of wear after too many battles?

But the monster was out of sight,
As was the fear you once harboured for it.
And that was what mattered.

But just as the moon never truly disappears in the day,
And instead hides behind the sun’s rays,
The monsters weren’t really gone.
They had started to grow within you,
As you outgrew your tiny childhood room
And your tiny childhood wardrobe.
They needed more space and
What's more spacious than the infinite void in your heart?

This went unnoticed for a while,
Because eyes weren’t meant to see the soul,
And the brain wasn’t designed to comprehend voids.
But the monsters in the closets of your past turned into skeletons,
No longer haunting you at night, but in the day —
Right before you step onto the stage
With the microphone in your hand,
Right before entering the hall to write a test
You studied all year for,
Or simply in a room full of people.

These skeletons do not talk;
They are dead, after all.
They just pull at your stomach,
Tug at your heart,
Swirl thoughts around.
Eating you from the inside to grow flesh for their bones.
Soon enough, you're back to being that little kid,
Crouched at the far end of the bed,
As the skeletons morph back into the monsters
You knew all too well.

But they no longer fit,
For you have shrunk.
So they wrench open your ribcage,
Struggling violently to free themselves.
They crawl out,
Yet remain tethered to your limbs,
Because the monster wears your skin —
Your skin you've been feeding them
Ever since play pretend became lame,
Ever since colourful things became "childish,"
Ever since you started towering over your mother.

And when you face the monster
You tried so hard to avoid when you were younger,
And you begin to see a familiar face and soul,
And a pair of eyes you understood,
You start to run away,
Because we tend to run from what we fear,
We tend to run from fear itself,
We tend to run from ourselves
When we think we’ve become exactly
What we swore not to be.

But the more you run,
The more the monster chases,
The more the oxygen in your lungs starts to run out,
The more you struggle to breathe,
The more your limbs stop working,
The weaker you become,
The more likely you get swallowed whole.

Fear is like encountering a bear in the wild,
You can’t outrun bears,
You can only play dead and hope you get spared.
But just as not all bears are brown,
Not all fears are worth avoiding and hiding from.
Some fears are black bears,
Where you have to stop, turn around,
Stand your ground and glare.

Project confidence, project control,
Even when you feel none.
You don’t have to believe it,
It’s a performance for the monsters
That we are stronger and bigger than they are,
Until we manage to convince ourselves.

Fake it till you make it.

And when that’s done,
Hug the monster, whisper in its ear,
“I’m sorry that you are afraid.
The person you have been dying to become,
It’s right here all along, within you.”

© R