Jacketed

The jacket, with every leather scratch and frayed

stitch, strangled my body like a psych ward patient.

Fighting every urge to rip the pieces of chrome-tanned

hyde that's slowly suffocating me.

Concealed from the outside, the epicenter of my

life remains unseen, hidden by this grotesque, bulky,

ill -fitted outerwear.

Jacketed with embarrassment, coated with mortification,

stitched together with the remains of a harmless creature.

The organic, skinned animal covers what is truly within.

Dressed in a lie, coated in deception, and stained with red—

because to you, you do not know what is hidden, to me,

I am hidden beneath this—jacketed.