I want to tell you but the words never come out right. They twist,they blur, and by the time they reach you I’m afraid they sound like nothing at all. I talk, but you don’t hear me or maybe you do, just not the way I meant. And each misheard syllable cuts deeper than silence. The truth is, I’m cut off from my own heart. It’s like someone dimmed the wires inside me, so even when I love, I can’t light the room with it. I see you breaking, and I want to hold you, but my arms don’t move. I want to speak, but my voice locks in my throat. I’m sorry. I don’t know how to feel the way you need me to. I don’t know how to show you that I care more than these broken words can carry. And it hurts to watch another reach you in ways I can’t. It hurts to know my silence looks like absence, when in truth, my silence is just me drowning. So I whisper this to you, and to myself: I am trying. Even if the world only hears my quiet, I swear, inside me is a storm calling your name.