Image issue

I learned young how to hide in long sleeves,

How to smile while my hands shook underneath,

Every mirror felt like evidence,

Every memory sat under my skin.

There’s a line above my left wrist still faded,

From a night I swore I wouldn’t make it,

And the scars turned silver over time,

But they still burn when I close my eyes.

People say the body heals itself,

Like flesh forgets the hands it’s dealt,

But mine remembers every door slammed shut,

Every scream, every bruise, every loss.

I still flinch when footsteps hit the floor,

Like I’m waiting for that version of before,

And I hate how survival leaves traces,

Like ghosts living under my veins.

I can cover every mark with ink,

But I can’t erase the way I think,

’Cause pain doesn’t leave when the bleeding stops,

No.

My body keeps score,

Every scar’s a sentence I can’t ignore,

Every nerve still humming like alarms,

Every memory sleeping in my arms.

And I tried to wash it out,

Tried to drown the echoes in my mouth,

But no matter how far I run—

My body remembers what I’ve done. My body keeps score.

There’s fingerprints buried in my bones,

Voices I still hear when I’m alone,

A thousand tiny cuts nobody saw,

’Cause invisible wounds don’t shock at all.

I learned how to laugh at the wrong time,

How to say “I’m okay” like a lifeline,

How to starve the ache until it slept,

Even when it clawed inside my chest.

And some nights I swear I feel it all again,

Like the past crawled underneath my skin,

Like every touch rewired my brain

Into something built from fear and shame.

I look at photos and don’t know her face,

Don’t know when the light got replaced,

Just know one day I woke up cold

With a heart too tired to hold.

And everyone says “just let it go,”

Like trauma leaves because you tell it so,

But pain grows roots inside your ribs,

And mine never did.

My body keeps score,

Every scar’s a sentence I can’t ignore,

Every nerve still humming like alarms,

Every memory sleeping in my arms.

And I tried to wash it out,

Tried to silence every screaming thought,

But no matter how hard I run—

My body remembers what was done. My body keeps score.

I carved survival into my skin,

Just to prove I still existed then,

’Cause when your mind becomes a war,

You start needing evidence you survived it all.

And maybe that’s why healing hurts,

’Cause you mourn the person you were first,

The child who thought the world was safe,

Before fear became stitched into their veins.

My body keeps score,

Even when my memory shuts the door,

Even when I swear I’ve finally healed,

There’s wounds my skin still lets me feel.

And I’m tired of carrying ghosts,

Tired of feeling broken at my core,

But maybe surviving all this pain

Means my body fought to stay.

Yeah maybe every scar I wore

Was proof

So if my hands still shake at night,

If my heart still fears the light,

Maybe healing isn’t forgetting anymore—

Maybe it’s learning to live

With the score.