Invisible Illness (IBS Awareness Month)

Heat builds and burns just beneath the surface of my skin

And yet, you feel nothing

“It’s in your head,” you say, meaning to be reassuring

Not understanding

Skin feels pulled too tight over sharp bones

That strain against

Prison walls built of sinew and boiling blood

That freezes over

Shooting a chill through the body, creating fog

That blinds and confuses

“Focus,”

you snap fingers that don’t feel

Stiff and broken

Within wary-weary veins rages a battle leaving behind

Battered corpses of my cells

But it’s internal this battle and you only see

The physical

I lift up these skeletal hands costumed in flesh

To apply blush

Over dead skin, move these lips to form words,

“Smile, pretty girl, don’t make a sound

They can’t and don’t

Want to see

Your pain.”

 

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