Unspoken

At the café, steam curls

from a cracked cup, untouched.

Laughter threads the air—

a story slips out,

one I never stopped

though it clipped my edges,

rewriting the shape

I held in their eyes.

I kept quiet—

a cracked mask pressed against

a fragile, whispered truth.

What weight the silence holds,

how thick it swells between us,

a fissure never patched,

something rotten

in the bitter coffee.

Words pinned down,

shadows in the fog,

a lie folded tight

and left alone,

a secret I swallowed,

a truth that never woke.