If I speak, will I die?

by:

Reese Janelle Tan

Published

May 23, 2026

I have a mouth.
It was given the grace to be able to talk,
to give meaning to the unspeakable,
the grant to carry on with feeling,
that has it trembling beneath permissible light.

Maybe crying meant I was a defect,
a defect in a mentally progressing society.
I was a flaw in temperament.
I let them know that I had failed at enduring.
That I had felt too much,
and asked too many questions,
bent too easily toward grief,
lingered too long where others had learned
to leave pain out in the air.

“Tulog mo na lang ’yan.”
“Ikain mo na lang ’yan.”
Or worse: “Idasal mo ’yan sa Kaniya.”

Resilience lives amongst the sharpest of tongues.
It comes with money
and the refusal to ask for help,
perhaps help had always existed,
along with the money
and the reverence,
for those who could afford
do-overs and cover-ups.

Weak is curiosity,
a form of rally.

Boring yourself within political boundaries
to remain in the margins,
for it is the only place
you would ever be noticed.

Weak is a paradoxical fault,
often tied too closely
to strong emotions
and feelings of exhaustion.

Questioning, in its highest pejorative sense,
is a weakness to those in power.

To ask
is to suggest that something has failed.

Change thrives in overreaction,
rather than dismissal.

“They would have slept through it.”
“Ate through it.”
“Prayed through it.”
“Worked through it.”
“Lived through it.”