& I don’t say anything

as you sit there

dropping strands of hair into the basin,

methodical,

like feeding coins to a wishing well

but no wish ever comes true,

just that soft click-hum

as your wrist-port processes each offering,

trauma encrypted and uploaded

to a cloud no one ever talks about

we all have them now—

emotion regulators

polished chrome and skin-warmed silicone,

approved by therapists, subsidized by the state

because who has time for breakdowns anymore?

who can afford to cry

when grief isn’t PTO-eligible?

yours takes sadness in hair

mine takes anger through blood

others drip loneliness in saliva,

neatly bottled

and scanned with QR codes

and no one ever looks up

I watch you shed yourself

and I don’t say stop

because it’s working, isn’t it?

you’re still going to work

still answering messages

still saying “I’m fine, haha” with a believable smile

and isn’t that what healing is now?

being efficient?

being palatable?

I haven’t used mine in days

just… left it idle

and now everything tastes like static

like I’m glitching under the surface

& I dig my nails into my skin

not because I want to feel pain

but because I want to feel anything

that isn't clean, compressed, processed

my mother said

“why can’t you just let the machine help you?”

my sister said

“you always make everything harder than it has to be”

the system said

regulation successful. distress levels nominal.

but how do you explain

that sometimes the machine works too well

that the sadness was a signal

and now you’re just

a signal without a sender?

& I watch you again

another strand, another sacrifice

and I wonder

how many more feelings you have left to lose

before there’s nothing in you

but processed silence

and perfect behavior

& I don’t say anything

because I’m afraid

if I do

you’ll start asking me how I am

and I’ll have to admit

I haven’t been real

in months.