The outside is smooth,  

polished,  

a delicate illusion of perfection,  

as if I have learned  

how to smile just right,  

to stand just tall enough  

to fool the world.  

But inside,  

I am a thousand pieces,  

fractured, jagged,  

like glass too thin  

to hold itself together.  

Each crack is a memory,  

a scar I tried to hide,  

a word I swallowed  

before it could escape.  

They run deep,  

not seen by the eyes that pass by,  

but felt by the quiet,  

aching corners of my soul.  

I pretend it doesn’t matter,  

this fractured heart,  

this mind crumbling beneath the weight  

of things unsaid,  

things undone.  

I patch it up,  

smooth over the edges,  

but the fissures grow,  

spreading like veins of fire,  

burning beneath the surface.  

There is no fixing it,  

no making it whole again,  

and yet I try—  

with every breath,  

with every smile,  

I pretend I am fine.  

But if you looked closer,  

if you looked long enough,  

you’d see the shattered pieces  

of me,  

hidden just beneath the skin.