The Girl Inside My Head

The girl inside Clara’s head -

The prototype -

wears confidence like a second skin. 

She never trips over apologies.

Her silence is a language people lean in to hear.

The prototype owns shelves of untouched trophies, 

aces every test without a breath.

Her paintings hang in quiet galleries,

while Clara’s are stuffed behind the bed.

Everyone loves the prototype.

And Clara is so jealous she could break,

because the prototype is the version of Clara 

that never learned the shape of pain.

Clara wants to wear her creation’s life like a dress.

She wants to feel what it’s like to speakand know the words will land softly,

instead of clotting beneath the thread.

Clara practices that confidence in the mirror.

She tries on those smiles like borrowed jewelry,

but the fit is all wrong, a clumsy disguise,

a performance that fails to reach Clara’s eyes.

What’s worse is that she crafted the prototype, 

from scraps of perfection and borrowed courage.

From every “I wish I’d said.”

From every “If only this happened”

Clara carved this vision from her best intentions,

and breathed life into her.

But the golem has outgrown her maker;

The sculpture critiques the sculptor’s hand.

Clara is scared of her creation, yes, 

but the fear is a kind of worship.

She wants to crawl into the space between her prototype’s eyes.

And live there till the stars dare not shine.

But in the darkness,

when the real world is quiet and cruel,

Her creation is the one who leans in,

not with a sneer, but with a spark.

The prototype doesn't say, "Why aren't you me?"

She whispers, her voice a low, urgent fire,

"Do better than me.

I am just the sketch. You are the hand that draws.

I am the destination. You are the road.

Surpass this phantom. Become."

And so Clara is haunted, not by a demon,

but by the very best version of herself —

a beautiful, unbearable weight

that somehow gives her wings.