Tired, truly

Tired, truly.
Of words that fall out reckless from careless tongues;
half-formed, half-thought, like they were never meant
to mean anything at all.
How can’t they see or understand pain unless it’s theirs to claim?
How can their eyes never learn to read truth unless it flatters them?

Tired, truly.
This thing once called common sense
now feels rarer than peace,
rarer than listening.
This blindness to another’s ache.
How strange.

Tired, truly.
Of being weighed, measured, and still found suspicious
for just existing without apology, for being ambiguous.

Tired, truly.
Of being the quiet storm
holding the walls up when others crumble.
The twenty-four-seven adult in every room;
steady, sensible, never allowed to unravel,
never allowed to stumble.

Tired, truly.
Just wanting to vanish into the simplicity of being,
to breathe without permission,
to exist without life’s expectations,
without society whispering
be smaller, softer, submissive.

Because I am none of that.
I am the witness to everything that’s made me me,
the wound, the cure, the protest, the one fighting cruelty.
I’m the one who is still able to love
in a world that keeps trying to teach her
that it is a sin.

Tired, truly.
But just awake, not defeated.