Fog

Her life is a bittersweet rememberance of warm memories.
But they're just that:
Memories.
She reaches out across her crumbling resistance to touch,
To feel that happiness radiating,
That melodious laughter long faded,
The comfort of familiar times and traditions.
But all she encounters is a cold, wet fog,
Cruelly reminding her of an unwanted reality.
As she stumbles through school, chores, and the blur of her own tears,
She constantly whispers to herself to keep a stiff upper lip and determination in her eyes;
Each day just barely maintaining a convincing façade of normalcy and control.
Occasionally the mask slips,
And her demons are revealed to the worried faces of those she loves most
Who watch through a thick wall of glass, unable to reach her.
Eyes bloodshot, mouth drawn in a everlasting cringe
Ragged soul red, raw, and screaming;
She collapses onto the rough concrete
And looks up to the strangely illuminated array of the clouds in the forboding night sky
While drops of warm salty water simmer;
One right after the other they fall from her eyes.
She tries desperately to recover from that fateful mishap,
That inopportune break in her deceiving appearance
That took so much energy to hold onto,
But it’s too late now; she has nothing left to cover her insecurities with
Like a warm but threadbare blanket just a couple of feet too short
That always brutally exposes a tender part of her,
When all she wants to do is be four again and wonderfully oblivious.
She wants to pull that blanket over her head
And disappear from the world and the monsters in her closet.
The fog thickens.
When will it finally pass? Will it at all?