The closet is not a box.
it is a God.
i was raised catholic
enough to kneel for anything
that promised no heaven nor tongue.
Call it chrysalis or crypt,
either way,
you are not supposed to live
through it.
The walls dust like a secret
being born.
i wear
smiles that don’t twitch.
they say: you’re so well-behaved.
I nod like an exit wound.
When they said monster,
i see the silhouette,
yet it don\'t snarl,
but it trembles voice
learning to say me.
not terror,
just tenderness turned toxic.
a not-taut thing tortured
until the horns matured.
the body is a learned language.
mine faltered.
i tried to exorcise the alphabets
from my hips and clothes,
carve her out with
discrete devotion,
but she remained,
a gash like tattoo,
teaching me new names
for Beelzebub.
My name melodized in reverse
is still unsingable.
even the echo
refuses to recite it back.
when my father said,
boys don’t cry like that,
i almost thanked him
for noticing.
i wore tuxedo
like an abandoned suit:
tattered,
oversized,
smelt in faint
of someone else’s funeral.
The mirror inside is not a glass.
it is an altar.
and each reflection
is a sign masked
in the wrong pronoun.
in dreams,
i am soft and unholy.
they clap like i’ve died.
like i’ve finally understood
how to disappear correctly.
she turns to speak.
her voice is gnawing
wrapped in purple tulips.
she says,
we are not monsters.
just stories told
by elders and legends.
Some nights,
i duct tape the closet shut
and call it therapy.
but the air still smells
like ghost of perfume.
I set myself on fire
so they wouldn’t notice
i was freezing.
Then I confess:
i didn’t survive.
i adapted.
there’s a difference.
And if that’s not
an obituary,
then what is?
The therapist said,
draw your monster.
I drew a girl
laughing in a burnt white dress.
she had my eyes
before i tore them out
for looking.
I said,
she’s what i’d be
if god were less cruel.
He frowned,
wrote down delusion.
i wanted to correct him:
you mean divinity.
This is how closets work:
you enter because it’s safer
than explaining why
your heartbeat sounds
like run.
You stay
because even silence
is the monster too.
I wanted to be real.
instead i became
palatable.
//
and if that’s not suicide,
then what is?