psychotherapy’s a bitch when you like to bottle up

because you hid yourself away

from curious eyes,

breath shallow,

throat tightening,

and nothing could mollify

the fire licking your intestines

you appreciate it, you do

here in the waiting room

fluorescent lights that are

oh so good at blinding

lemon disinfectant

p e r m e a t e s

the air and you

can't breathe

and somehow

you like it

you kept things from them

you thought they wouldn't want to hear

dancing widdershins around your own feelings

because feelings are for the real ones

and fantasy is an escape

but here when your only task is to feel

your heart torn open with the

most precise scalpel

and digging around in there

they try to find why you feel so

l o s t

and present you with solutions

and you smile because they are trying to help you

they do not expostulate with you like the others

and you thank them for that

bottling emotions like water

swallowing them and they have

the most bitter aftertaste

enough to make you spit them up again

soon as you get here

because you wait for this place

and it's a bitch

it's such a bitch

and maybe that's why you're healing