The Library of Things I Didn’t Say

My chest is a library

for all the things I didn’t say.

◆

The big confessions

sit on the highest shelves,

hardcovers with dust jackets

too shiny to touch.

I keep them there

So I can pretend

I don’t own them.

◆

Closer to eye level

live the paperbacks:

small apologies

with cracked spines,

dog-eared pages where

I almost spoke up

and didn’t.

◆

Every “I’m fine”

got a whole series—

volume after volume

of near-silent storms,

typed in invisible ink

Only I can read

when the room goes dark.

◆

You have your own library,

I know.

I see it in the way your jaw

locks like a glass door

after hours.

We browse each other carefully,

as if one wrong touch

will send all the shelves

crashing down.

◆

There’s a special section

for the kindnesses I swallowed:

compliments I never gave you,

chances to say “stay”

that I traded

for a safer nod.

They whisper at night,

restless paragraphs

pacing at the margins.

◆

In the back corner,

under flickering light,

There’s a locked cabinet:

the moment I knew I loved you,

pressed flat between two chapters

of “maybe I’m imagining this.”

The key still smells like panic.

◆

Librarians in movies

Always know where things belong.

Mine is just a tired version of me,

misfiling feelings

under “later,”

shoving fear and tenderness

onto the same shelf

and wondering why

They fight.

◆

Some days I fantasize

about a clearance sale—

tables on the sidewalk

piled with old, unspoken things.

“Take one truth,

leave one ghost,”

A sign would say.

I’d watch strangers walk off

with parts of my silence

and feel lighter

than I deserve.

◆

But mostly,

I’m learning to check things out

instead of just storing them.

To take a sentence down,

blow the dust off,

and hand it to you

while my fingers shake.

◆

It’s clumsy,

This new lending program.

Sometimes I choose the wrong book,

say too much,

Or flip to the ending

before you’re ready.

Sometimes I slam the cover shut

mid-conversation

and pretend it was a draft.

◆

Still—

There are new shelves

being built with softer wood,

labels written in pencil,

a chair in the middle

where we can sit

and read each other

out loud.

◆

Maybe one day

the library of things I didn’t say

will be smaller

than the one

I did.