Poetry Collection

An old one I wrote back in junior high about what it felt like when teachers asked me a question (social anxiety and selective mutism kicking in)

I Wish I Was Invisible

My face is on fire.

I just want to hide, to disappear under my desk.

Please don't look at me.

I'm already too aware of my 

Painfully shy eyes,

Trembling hands,

Lips moving without sound.

I keep trying, waiting for the words to spill out

Like the tears that have gathered in my eyes,

But my voice has turned to dust, my lungs to ashes,

And I cannot speak.  

Let me hide, just for a while?

I am drowning in the stares, the pressure.

This is why I prefer to sit against the wall.

I hate the pricking of imaginary whispers on my back.  

They don't notice the tidal wave of panic sweeping me away 

When I hear my name

And the silence that follows after it.  

They can't see the flurry of my thoughts 

Stampeding into the distance

To leave nothing in my mind,

My tongue in tatters.  

Why do you talk to me?

I am the quiet one,

A shrinking violet

Hiding in the corner of the room.

And I wilt under pressure.  

My expression doesn't change,

I'm careful about that.

But I feel awkward in your eyes.

Awkward in my skin.  

My hands don't like the attention any more than I do.

Shaking, they retreat into deep caves

Made from sweater sleeves.

And I wish I was invisible.