I'm fine
Such a simple phrase
that escapes our lips and brushes against the tip of our
breath
As if the answer to the common "How are you?" really mattered
As if anyone ever really cared
As if there was ever any truth or meaning behind the two words
I'm fine
That middle ground between happy and sad or happy and mad,
fine
The mask we wear to cover our true problems, our true
feelings
I'm fine, the ficade, that hides us all
The boy being abused, pushed against the wall, beaten
The one cutting in the bathroom
The girl striving to be model thin, taking laxatives
As if the I'm fine made up for it
The social norm
that comes from our pit and crawls out our mouths
I'm just tired
As if that one commonality
that we all gain and all need and all drink twelve cups of coffee
to receive
is an excuse, is our disguise
The girl being bullied online
or the boy with the drinking problem
the teenage mother
As if the I'm tired, I'm fine blocks the pain
I'm fine, the vowels and consonances that wringle free of their
jail
The boy that cries himself to sleep
or the girl with the panic attacks
the boy that never got over his father's death
The I'm fine covers it all,
Packs it away like it didn't happen, it doesn't exist
As if a not would ever be slipped between the two words, the two
syllables, I'm fine
That one phrase, making it real, accepting it
If the I'm not fine, I'm not okay ever brokeout
It would all be changed
And our veil would be uncovered
So you hold it in one more time
and let the I'm fine release itself
*Poem for school* What do you guys think?