To the Fishbowl, Again

By Leiani Brown

yeah

i told you i'd try

not because i will

but because i have learned how to please

how to shut people up, out

i live in a replica fish bowl

where i am surrounded by alien clone fish

i've met their doppelgängers

and learned to hate them each

one by one

then left my fish bowl home

to meet their doubles

and learn hate

all over again

and it's funny when you think if you think if you dare if thinking is your thing if you don't fear

pain

it's funny,

i succumbed to this naive belief--

its clutches so cowardly beautiful

--that running by flying

away meant newness

newness in the smell of wind

newness in the shape of trees

newness in the people that people my dreams and people my inside and people i wish

i was

but even paradise has its parasites

complete with plastered smiles  

pity--shot out from every angle

side glances and ulterior messages,

dripping in its dense gooeyness that shouldn't but does make me feel like nothing

until all i am is a pile of the stuff--

and nothing i or you can do will make your kindness

not taste forced

"congratulations you changed the scenery

emptying pockets and filling expectations in the process

only to realize nowhere is new enough

to make people not people you know

to make hate not the spoiled result of you trying to love them

to make opening up not feel like a chasm awaiting daggers

to make you

not you"

i mumble this

in my skin every time i walk away

leaving you believing you've somehow helped

and you have

you've given me practice to learn how to please

how to shut people up

and out,

how to shut people out.

because i don't even like fish,