"just breathe" she said, like i'm not already doing that, like breathing isn't the one thing i can't seem to stop doing, the city got quiet enough to hear it, the blood rushing and it sounds like the ocean but smaller, trapped in this shell, and i wonder if everyone else hears it too, that internal roar that never shuts up, or if i'm just extra wired, or maybe not wired at all, maybe just frayed, like the threads of this blanket, thin and worn from pulling it up to my chin for all these years, all these sleepless decades, and it's soft, almost gone, but i can't let it go, and that's what she means, i guess, try to hold onto something that can’t hold onto you, breathe