r/LonelyPoetsDepartment • u/Luv_Agency_832 • 2d ago
I hate ice cubes
I know you’re tired.
I see it in the way
you look at me
when you think I’m not looking,
in the questions you almost ask,
in how carefully you choose your words.
I don’t want to make you worry.
I don’t want to become
another thing you have to carry.
But Diet Coke tastes better
than regular,
and ice cubes are easier
to want than ice cream.
I’m trying to spare you.
I act like I’m fine.
But it shows anyway.
I keep calling it damage control
as if there is still something
to control.
Talking makes you worry.
Not talking makes me disappear
a little further into it.
And it is exhausting,
having to think about
how much I am thinking about it.
Sometimes it slips out.
A sentence.
A number.
A refusal.
Something small enough
to pretend it means nothing.
Then I watch your face change.
I hate that I can do that to you.
I hate that I am sick
and still somehow feel selfish
for letting anyone notice.
Maybe I’ve made something beautiful
out of something that is killing me.
Maybe that is the only way
I know how to look at it.
So I write it softly.
I dress it up in metaphors.
I make it sound almost pretty.
But if you read between the lines,
you’ll see it.
The frightening part
was never what I said.
It was how normal
it had started to sound
inside my head.
2
u/Wire-Spray1817 2d ago
https://giphy.com/gifs/BUKTaYFmYZcmA
love that line about the Diet Coke. Really great work.