Fragments of myself fell off
until I had lost them all,
I had lost the soul
until I was nothing
but a performing shell-
I had forgotten
who I was because I tried so hard
to fit,
I never wanted to but sometimes practicality overrules desire,
sometimes I forced myself to collapse
after the black stars in front of my face began to fade
and sometimes I threw the crown off of my head
because the attention meant that they might know.
I lost myself becoming one of them
and I forgot to pick up the remnants
of who I once was,
the memories that rested deep under my ribs
were only recovered once they cracked
and once the heart dissolved in the caustic acids of life.