it’s hard to be myself :(

it’s hard to be myself when i don’t know who that person is,

so i pick traits i think a stranger would like,

and i act.

i act like my life depends on it

sometimes i’m so good at it that i forget that it’s just a role

but then, fortunately or unfortunately, when that person, for one reason or another leaves my life

i’m back to square one, back to this blank slate,

this empty canvas, this wordless page.

it’s hard to be myself when i’m a collection of things that people love to hate and hate to love.

so much of who i am is so dependent on who i’m with, where i am, how i am, and why i need to be that particular person.

i am a bottle with a hole at the bottom,

i am a sieve of traits.

it’s hard to identify with one, when i could so easily be the other

fluidity, that’s what they call it.

i think it’s my inability to be assertive within myself.

it’s easy for me to tell other people no, or yes, but i can’t quite deceive myself like that.

and so i use words whose meanings i’m familiar with,

ones that someone can relate to,

so that i don’t feel so blank.

but when i turn off the lights, and i lock my phone,

when even my shadow has retired to bed,

therein lies a vacuum, one that i’ve never been able to really, truly fill.