Versions

I’ve collected versions of myself,  
Not so much eras, though I have my share.  
With every friend, family member, or lover,  
Coming or going,  
I’ve collected a small piece, good and bad,  
Keeping them a part of me.  
I have pages upon pages of literature created by us—  
Every text,  
Every event,  
Creating a textbook, and I always keep a piece.  
To some, it looks like gibberish, but that’s how we talked at work to each other.  
Sounds like cat cries, but that’s what kept us laughing till dawn.  
Feels like barely surviving, but that’s what kept us so close.  
I put on masks for the masses, but these people that my brain wished to imitate to the point of copying pages—  
I was myself.  
Loud, fun, carefree—  
Everything the world can’t understand about me.  
I have versions of myself that seep into the me now,  
Ones that, if you weren’t there,  
You’d never know.  
I look at all the masks on the wall, the eras stacked in the closet like skeletons waiting to burst out with a fright,  
And the giant pile of versions—  
So big,  
You’re unable to walk into the room it’s in and pick.  
So packed in,  
They are starting to meld with the walls of this house that I am.  
Going into the bloodstream,  
Like saline,  
Like poison,  
And these create emotions and actions that this version doesn’t want to see.  
“Why did I snap this morning?”
Remember her? She hated mornings.  
“Why do I feel so fat?”  
Remember him? He felt the same way.  
“Why do I feel sad?”  
Remember her? She forgot to see silver linings.  
All of these versions,  
They create a sense of lostness among the sea of knowledge,  
Begging you to jump in.  
But what if you aren’t you?  
“Have you taken on another saying?”  
“Have you really begun calling it that?”  
“Did you really buy that?”  
SHUT UP!  
I am me, just  
With additions.  
I love with my whole heart,  
It’s great when it’s great,  
And devastating when it isn’t.  
Pages overlapping,  
Cut up,  
Pasted,  
Creating this melting pot of me—  
So many different people,  
But I’m me.  
“You never liked that before?”  
Well, she showed me.  
“Why do you think so much?”  
His stories.  
“Why can’t you sleep?”  
Because I have all of these voices from memories.  
STOOOOOOP!  
Screaming in my ear.  
QUIET!  
And keeping me  
Here.