I see it,
feel it,
my skin speaking up
where my thoughts fail me
\u2013 at least the ones I can form into words \u2013
something is wrong
we are hiding something<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I try to hear what my skin has to tell me
but I do not speak the language
of these quiet white flakes,
these dumb red rashes,
so I feel as if I’m in some unfamiliar building
with an alarm going off
and no one around me is moving
I can treat the symptoms with cream,
lay it on thick
and prevent the worst
by wearing gloves when I wash up.
Although I much prefer to go without,
to get the sting of satisfaction
feeling smooth ceramic through the hot water’s stream.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I know there is something I’m not seeing;
some stress I must have buried some time in 2019.
I thought I was doing well, then,
Pandemic was a board game,
Suicide a drink (or a workout,
depending who you ask)
but some small misery, maybe, started it all for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I do my best to feel it out,
sometimes stay quiet, stare at leaves
I offer forgiveness to the skin
and gratitude for its openness;
for its loyalty to stay with me
even when I don’t understand,
even though all I can do is scratch the surface.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I see it,
\nfeel it,
\nmy skin speaking up
\nwhere my thoughts fail me
\n…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[25],"class_list":["post-179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry","tag-bodies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=179"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":203,"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179\/revisions\/203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diary.katemcaleer.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}