Unseen Wounds

It’s not the sound that gives them away.

It’s the silence.

The kind that breathes.

They are everywhere.

Above me.

Beside me.

Behind me.

Inside me.

Not human eyes.

Not entirely.

They don’t blink.

They don’t soften.

They don’t forget.

They follow even when I’m alone.

They study the way I breathe,

as if even air has to be earned.

I stop moving the way I used to.

I keep my hands close.

My words closer.

Because here, every movement is a confession.

They look for mistakes.

They savor them.

They don’t want the truth —

only the pieces of it that can be twisted.

And I wonder—

is it them watching me,

or have I learned to watch myself through their eyes?

Maybe the worst kind of surveillance

is the one we carry inside our own skulls.

The echo of judgment that never leaves.

The memory of being caught when you weren’t doing anything wrong.

I live like a shadow now.

Not unseen—

but ungraspable.

Because if they can’t hold me,

they can’t crush me.

And one day,

when they least expect it,

I will turn around and look back.

And I will not look away.