I lied

It’s the wind in the box,
Whispers unheard about what we won’t talk about,
To keep our damage minimal,
Contained in four walls and a close-etched lid,
Our names scratched into all sides and burned at the bottom.
I can only tell you why the box is closed,
You may never know why the box is opened.
My secret is in the rough, unfinished edges,
The dark spots that are my favorite and the cuts where emotion ran too deep and never healed.
Fleshy undersides and innards are revealed,
The parts no one was supposed to see.
But when you watch the box,
When your hands hesitantly grasp the sides and I tell you not to open it,
Whispering the lore of Pandora and Idis under my breath as I watch you peek inside,
You gape wide-eyed in hurt and confusion and respect.
I knew it was useless from the beginning
I knew you would warily look inside, overturning the stones to shine light on the gray and the wet and the cold which we pretended not to be there.
You see the bottom of the box,
The roots where the tree had grown and where things were sanded and left to weather,
I see only the entire entity,
My hands on yours as we both will it to close,
And the dark inside too deep for either of us to firmly grasp on our own.