The Problem

The problem is not dark.

It's easy to say it is because it's plausible.

When you say you're afraid of the dark, people judge you, but they let it go. Because being scared of the dark is acceptable. It is easy to fear what you can't see.

But the problem is not dark.

No, it is not a lack of vision that makes my bones freeze, my hair stands on the ends and fills my eyes with tears.

No, it's not it who pulls my shoulders down, who shuts my mouth in the middle of a conversation, building a wall between me and the outside world.

It's not dark that who darkens my soul.

It is not the one who squeezes my chest until I'm out of breath.

It was never the one to numb my body, starting with the tips of my fingers and ending in my soul.

The dark was never responsible for anything.

Is that Thing the one guilty.

That Thing that appears in the middle of the night, entering my chest with cruel tentacles that gag my desires. It is It creating a bubble of hysteria that grows in my throat and bursts in the middle of that math class because suddenly, the screams have become so loud that I can no longer pretend I didn't hear them.

It's the attempt to sleep whispering promises in the corner of your mind. I'm lying down, tiredness taking over me entirely, but it just won't let me sleep.

It's the biting sensation that screams at me. It rips me apart. It opens me up completely. Humiliate me. Turn me inside out. Killing me from within. Destroying me. Leaving me in pieces.

And it leaves for help that never came and will never come because this Thing takes the voice out of your mouth and leaves me... Alone.

So, so alone.

I am surrounded by people, but I have never felt so alone.

Can they see the panic when they look into my eyes?

No, they don't see it.

But if they did... I would say it's just the dark.

It is the one who does this to me.

It is the lack of light that is to blame for these things.

It is the dark, the one who leaves me like this, freezing cold.

And I sit here, paralyzed, without being able to understand why.

Since it's sunny outside.