It didn’t happen like a movie.
no sudden sunrise.
no epiphany in the rain.
just a slow, aching silence
that stretched for years—
the kind of silence you start calling home
because you forget how to want anything louder.

I didn’t crash.
I didn’t scream.
I just stopped.
little by little,
I became background noise in my own life.

people said “you’ll find it again.”
like it was a thing I’d dropped
in the backseat of some old car.
but it wasn’t lost.
it was buried.
under disappointments,
under tired smiles,
under the slow erosion of giving too much
and getting too little back.

then one night,
doing nothing special—
just sitting in the dark,
bone-tired and emptied out—
I felt it.

not hope.
not fire.
just a pulse.
faint.
but mine.

I didn’t trust it.
didn’t believe it.
but I listened.
because after everything,
there was nothing left to lose.

so I followed the pull.
crawled, some days.
broke open, others.
but kept going.

and now—
I won’t lie, it’s still hard.
some mornings, I still feel like ash.
but the spark?
it’s here.
it’s small.
but it’s real.
and for the first time in years,
so am I.

My inner girl still sits
cross-legged on cold tile,
shoulders pinched in,
stomach knotted—
braced for impact.

Every shadow’s a warning.
Every silence, a loaded gun.
Even a sigh
can mean run—
because quiet
always came with a cost.

She waits—
for the voice to rise,
for the heat behind the words,
for the breaking of glass
or trust
or bone-deep calm
she barely dared to build
from whispered steps
and held-in breath.

And now,
grown,
far from that house,
she still flinches
when someone is gentle—
still waits for the catch,
the crack,
the shift.

Because peace
never stayed.
It was just the pause
before the next lesson
in how love
can turn cruel.

She waits—
small,
hidden under skin and scar,
always ready
to shrink,
to nod,
to apologize
for taking up
too much air.

I held it all
inside my chest—
anger, regret,
every dirty secret
I thought made me
unworthy,
ugly truths
piled up
like garbage
I couldn’t bury
fast enough.

I clenched my teeth
until my jaw cracked,
bit back screams
until my throat
was a fist,
locked, shaking.

Nobody warned me
that silence
rots from the inside,
that quiet poisons
faster than words,
that the things I hide
are sharper
when they’re held back
too long.

Now, I explode—
a mess,
a disaster,
wreckage thrown everywhere,
hurting everyone
I love,
covering everything
in the pieces
of all the shit
I thought I could swallow.

Holding it in
never protected anyone.
It just made sure
that when I broke,
it would be loud,
violent,
impossible
to undo.

Ugly isn’t scars.
It’s clean skin
and a mouth full of rot.

It’s a smile that cuts
and stays polite.
It’s kindness
with a leash.

Ugly is the lie
told like gospel,
the sorry that never comes—
just a shrug,
like wreckage is nothing.

It’s silence
when someone’s drowning.
It’s laughter
with teeth.

Ugly doesn’t hit.
It owns.
Ugly is power
sugarcoated in love,
a hand on your back
guiding you off a cliff.

It’s envy—
slow, bitter, patient—
you don’t deserve that
but I do
echoing behind every compliment.

It doesn’t scream.
It whispers.
Twists.
Waits.

Ugly shrinks people.
Teaches them
to flinch at kindness.
To hate themselves
for needing anything.

It wears a tie.
It kisses goodnight.
It blends in at dinner
and never breaks a sweat.

Ugly is calm.
Ugly is clever.
Ugly smiles while you bleed
and says
you’re overreacting.

Ugly doesn’t shout.
It rewrites.
Until you wonder
if it ever happened
at all.

A bottle passes hands
like a story told too often—
slurred,
half-true,
unfinished.

In one generation,
it begins as celebration—
a drink to mark the harvest,
a sip after long days.

In the next,
it becomes ritual.
Not joy,
but habit—
clockwork at dusk.

By the third,
it’s survival.
Not a choice,
but a rhythm—
the only quiet left
in a loud and empty room.

Names change.
Faces age.
But the sound
of the cap twisting off
echoes the same.

It is never just one life.
It is lineage.
A slow drip
through the veins
of a family tree
that grows crooked
in the shadow
of the glass.