Anxiety –
a whisper
interminable.

it starts before she wakes,

a pressure behind her ribs,
like the sky’s trying to
fold itself
into her lungs

every choice a trapdoor:
what if they stare?
what if they don’t?
what if she forgets how to speak
mid-sentence,
again?

her hands know the tremble
of thoughts that outrun her,
her jaw knows the ache
of swallowed screams.

in class she nods,
a puppet
on unravelling strings.
every sound too sharp,
every silence too wide.

her mind loops
replays
rewrites
the same fear
until it frays at the edges
and becomes part of her name.

friends ask what’s wrong.

she shrugs,
a smile stitched on—
but it holds like glass,
always one breath away from shattering.