The Raw Me

I was not raised.

I was worn down.

Piece by piece.

Day by day.

Until even my silence

started sounding like a wound.

Love came with conditions.

Family came with teeth hidden behind their smiles.

Friends came close enough to bleed me

and left me to swallow the proof.

I have been broken in places

no one ever named,

so now I flinch at kindness

like it is a threat

and call it instinct.

There are cracks in me

that never sealed,

holes where trust rotted out,

ashes where hope used to burn.

I am sick of surviving

what should have killed me

more softly.

Still — I am here.

Ragged.

Feral.

Dragging my own ruin behind me

like it is sacred.

I was taught to stand back up.

To keep moving.

To never betray the truth

alive inside my chest.

Because love sustains all,

and that is the only thing

I have left that still feels true.

This is the raw me.