Skeletons In My Closet

• Chloe Buhagiar, Grade 10, Model Farms High School
• Poetry
• 2022

Excellence Award in the 'Summertime Fun ONLINE' competition

My closet conceals skeletons that nobody knows,
Even I have no comprehension on how far back it truly goes.
Behind this hoax of a face that carries a false smile,
Sprawls a foreboding, remote road that goes on mile after mile.
Deceiving those who offer far too much trust,
Hiding an ancient melancholic set of doors coaxed with dust.
These silent screams of saudade from within carry no words,
The painful rush of unwanted emotions approaching in heavy herds.
Compared to it, good memories dissolve like water from my hands,
Spilling from between my trembling fingers but nobody ever understands.
They don’t see that I attempt to reach out desperate for their welcoming love,
But these stubborn bony fists tug me back as they push and they shove.
I’m thrown into the closet, surrounded by malefic, turned faces,
Features missing, replaced with twisted, hollow spaces.
Light seeps in from the padlocks crooked shape,
And I hide, unable to allow my loved ones to view me as the past I hate.