I Talk to Myself Because

I talk to myself

because I’m the only one

who answers me

in a language I’m not ashamed to hear.

Some days,

I spit prayers into mirrors

just to watch God flinch.

I write poems

not for applause,

but to prove I made it through another night

with my mind still intact

and my voice

still mine.

See—

my thoughts are crowded.

Every “should have,”

“could have,”

“wish they would have”

talks over each other

like ghosts at a family reunion

I never RSVP’d to.

You ever choke

on the silence

you built

to protect yourself?

Me too.

You ever love someone so hard

you stopped feeling it—

like a numb limb

after the fall?

Me too.

But I learned

some lessons don’t come

in full sentences.

They arrive

as bruises,

as pauses,

as breathing patterns

you don’t recognize anymore.

Like—

why does my inhale

sound like her name?

Why does my exhale

carry regret

like a passenger seat

never buckled in?

My favorite poet once said,

“Let the words be the wound and the bandage.”

So I bled

on this page

on purpose.

I talk to myself

because sometimes

I’m the only one listening

without interrupting my healing.