I bury myself in homework.

I smoke, to calm myself down.

I run when it gets to be too much.

I do all these things but still

all the time I want to scream.

I thought I knew him.

I thought he loved me.

She was never my friend,

and I keep thinking,

none of it was real.

The feeling of belonging,

of being loved,

of being at home.

I keep thinking that

I spent wasted time thinking

that I had a family,

that I was getting married,

that one day my body would finally

hold onto my child,

that I was were I would be

for the rest of my life,

that I knew how my life would play out.

I keep thinking that now,

I’ll be thirty before I have the baby I wanted next year,

that I might never have that baby,

that life…