(social anxiety in the tenth grade)

words are always getting tangled up on my tongue
like somewhere on the way to my mouth from my lungs
riding on a highway, a skyway of oxygen 
skatin’ over bones and their insides of collagen
at motorcycle speed, drive up the sides of my throat
only to come out of here on a completely wrong note
like, everything i try to say
comes out in the wrong way
like i-tried-but-i-didn't-quite-get-it ballet
i mess it all up
try to tell you how i feel on a near daily basis
my voice breakin' vases, 
your faces, i can tell that i’ve said the wrong thing
in this game i’m too early or late with my swing
i know i’ve gotta just fling the words out and stop holding back
but i’m on the wrong track, get these panic attacks
and it just makes me sad, having so much to say that’s not coming out
i think what would have changed if they hadn’t gone without me, if i’d just, 
participated
made some of my thoughts conjugated
all i did was wait, though,
for some sort of moment in time in which i would be able to speak
it was a messed-up technique ‘cause all it ever did was keep me quiet in the back of the room
it was the same in the front ‘cause even when i had somethin’ to say i could never explain so i just went to containing it and sayin’ maybe soon
leaving me remaining with not shit, i’m not it
i’m never gonna be the one raising my hand even though i’ve got the answer and i sorta wanna stand
and i give it up, all the time,
this dream of mine, the me that’s me at home,
when i’m alone, the one that doesn’t get all weird ‘cause there are people here, things to fear and nothing that i say comes out clear
i want her out here with me
it’s like nobody’s inside me and i act like a body that’s controlled by some puppeteer that i don’t even know
i just wanna be like everybody else 
in at least one way that’s just not like myself
they might misspell words and make grammatical errors all the time but they’re using their voices to express their emotions and that’s all i wanna do with mine
i wave and i can grin and i can make the signs
but when it comes to audio i’m gettin’ to the borderline
i don’t understand what makes a person like me
not like i’m spider-man, at least he had a reason to be
a different person than everyone else
me, I’m just the sorta kid that he would have to help
maybe i know how to spell but what’s the use of it
if everything i wanna say has to end with me doin’ it
it’s not like i really can’t do it, i mean, speak,
‘cause i do all the time with certain people talkin’ to me
but in front of all these other humans i feel like this alien, 
they look alive to me and here i am just standin’ here and  failin’ it
i’m sailin’ along across the written words 
and then i end up stumblin’ and fallin’ into waves of unheard
i’m just mumblin’ and nobody can hear it or adhere to it, it don’t stick, the meaning i’m tryin’ to convery with my lame tricks, oil slick slippin’ through your ears i’m sayin’ all the things you like but you don’t even hear, ah
if i could just record this and store it in the back of my mind
so that when i felt the need to speak i’d pull it out and chime in with what i had to say that i was never gonna say ‘cause it’s like better that way in my head they say the opposite instead so that i don’t even know right from left or my blues from my reds
this colorblind thing just out here wanderin’ in a place of sounds that she ain’t ever gonna try to repeat
the awful thing, though, i mean, is that they really don’t care about the mess-ups, they just don’t want this thing over here to keep supressin’ stuff when she’s all set to fight with her gear
just freakin’ talking and walkin’s a battle for me
that i’m fightin’ every day so that i can reach the master key, the treasure chest and all of the rest of that shit that’s like this metaphor for words
i just wanna want to be heard
so tomorrow when i tug the book of me off the shelf
i’ll just remember that the critic’s never them
it’s just myself

This poem is about: 
Me

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