I’ve mastered the art
of pretending,
wearing smiles like armor,
moving through the world
as if the bad, the ugly, the rotten
don’t exist.
I’ve learned to tuck them away,
each hurt, each betrayal,
folded neatly into the lowest drawer of my soul—
the one where the light
never reaches.
I never open it,
never peek inside,
afraid of what I might find
waiting.

But I am not as calm
as I seem.
I am an inactive...