Closet Monster

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?