i am not the girl you will fall in love with upon first sight
i am made of late nights, busy days, and a long hard past
i am not a pair of legs
i am the sum of all my thoughts
and everything i aspired to be when i was little
i am not a pair of almond-shaped eyes
i am a soft kiss on your cheek and your face nuzzled into my neck when it's 2 am and you can't handle everything
you will not fall for me upon first sight
but you will fall for me
slowly
as you get to know me
and i wouldn't have it any other way

so let's make friends with all our enemies
and remember things how they used to be
because life is short, but lonely nights are long
sometimes we all need to admit we're wrong
so let's make up, and let's be friends
this can't be how the story ends
life is short, hard times are long,
appreciate things like your favorite song
"when the music hits you, you feel no pain"
so let's make friends with all our enemies
and remember things how they used to be
because life is short,
but memories last long
we can all admit we're wrong
so let's make up, and let's be friends,
be okay with how the story ends

there's a blister on the ******* of my left hand
from carving pumpkins with you
my toes are still painted pink from when we went to the school dance
and there's a scar on my right cheek from when my brother got too angry and you
were the first one i called
but
the blister will heal
the scar will fade
and i think i just might paint my toes green

your memories will fade
and i will be okay

something's got an iron grip on my heart and i know it's not a person but there's no doubt in my mind that there are fingers squeezing the blood out of my heart like a ripe orange, trying to stop the beat beat my chest is being controlled by an invisible hand that is crushing my ribcage and compressing the most delicate parts of me oh im sorry that i can't love you but dear god i cannot breathe somebody please help my face is turning blue all i'm looking for is an escape from this hell can't you hear me screaming i am choking on stale air i am tired of where i am oh
living is difficult when you've forgotten how to breathe

my heart belongs to no one
you were always and forever the only one
to make the stormy skies brighter,
to make the dark places lighter
so we could face the coldest nights
with each other by our sides
so we could fill the plainest day
make all of our worries go away
my heart belongs to no one
you were always and forever the only one
to make it all okay.

when you say "no" and he says "please" SAY IT LOUDER
when you say "drive me home" and he says "five minutes" SAY IT AGAIN
when you say "no" and he says "just once" LEAVE
when you say "no" and he says "nobody has to know" SAY GO **** YOURSELF
when you say "no" and he says "but i bought you dinner" GET OUT OF THE CAR
when you say "no" and he says "yes" SAY NO

when you say no, SAY IT LOUDER, SAY IT AGAIN, LEAVE, GO **** YOURSELF, GET OUT OF THE CAR, NO

No.

im not a poet it's just that the low grumble of your voice sounds like music and the warmth of your embrace feels like home no im really not a poet just i can't stop comparing your laugh to a drink of cold water on a hot day and your touch to the sweet fingers of the hand that pulled me off that ledge right as i was about to jump oh i said im not a poet but i look for you in everything and i find you in all the good things in all of us, you are the reference point for every person i meet but they do not compare, they do not come close, my dear, i can compare you to hurricanes and tidal waves and stormy skies but, my dear, nobody and nothing comes close to the wonder that is you

DEPRESSION IS REAL.
depression is not being sad. depression is gray-tinted glasses that affect how you see the world, depression turns your emotions from stone to glass, you never knew the meaning of "emotionally unstable" until someone drops you half of a foot and you shatter. until someone cancels on you and somehow you find yourself sobbing in your room because the demons in your head tell you that nobody ******* cares about you, nobody ******* cares about you, nobody ******* cares about you.
depression is real. i can feel it in my chest and on my eyelids and in my head and i can even feel it's iron death grip on my throat.
some days i swore to God there was a four-ton elephant sitting pretty on my chest, but i was the only one who could see it. some days there were five-pound weights hanging from my eyelids and the only way to keep myself awake was to pump myself so full of caffeine that my hands shook while my eyes were still tired, making me exhausted and anxious and hyperactive all at once. some days it took hold of my head, squeezing my eyes so that my reflection was warped and twisted and grotesque, whispering into my ears that i needed to eat less. you need to eat less. some days it attacked my heart. i can not describe the sensation better than to say that some days it felt like my aortas were being beaten by dull wooden stakes or like my blood had been replaced with icewater.
you're sitting in class enjoying a captivating psychology lecture when that thought pops in your head: "why are you even alive?" and your blood freezes, your ribs tighten, and something grabs hold of your windpipe so that all you can do to not say "i want to die" when the teacher calls on you is shake your head and say "i don't know."
you're sitting in math class and you're supposed to be learning about integrals but all you can think about is everyone's reactions if you didn't wake up the next day; you're sick but all you notice is that no one noticed you were gone. maybe no one would notice if you were gone.

one year, food was all that could make me feel happy; i found hope in the dopamine rush from the sugary calories; i rejoiced at the satisfactory feeling i got from devouring half of a pan of brownies.
the next year, yes, i know i have always loved dark chocolate but today i just can't seem to taste it. or anything for that matter.
the only thing i could get myself to ingest were liquids that would take my memories away for a while. i had no problem pouring cheap caramel apple ***** down my throat but could not get myself to pick up a golden delicious and bite into it because i knew i wouldn't have be able to finish it anyway.

depression is real. depression is a ****** up monster that leaves no part of you untouched and can steal the very essence of who you are if you let it. depression can ******* rip you apart. someone will tell you that they love you and all you will be able to say in return is "no you don't."
depression takes away who you are. because you haven't always cried every day, you haven't always been unable to eat, you used to be able to stomach an "i love you" and you used to smile when you saw your little sister.
this is not you, this is depression, depression is real. you are not pretending, you are not 'not trying', you are not 'broken'; honey all you have are some unbalanced chemicals in your brain. but we're going to try as hard as we can to make them go back to normal. i know you're in there.

depression is real. but so are you.

i hope you miss me
like i miss you

and ill try not to read your letters
and forget the time i heard you say
"my life has been better since i met her"
ill pretend you're okay
pretend im glad that i had it my way
act like i don't miss you at all


august, you drowned while others swam
found yourself alone in your room
again and again

but not the crying kind of sad
the kind of laying in bed sad
where minutes turn into hours
and hours turn into days
that i haven't gotten out of bed
because there's no point
and no purpose
maybe in a different world
i'd be getting out of bed for you
but because of mistakes
and bad decisions
and calling it quits
far too early
im here
laying in bed
alone
and im sorry

you never tried to analyze me.
you never took a flashlight to the darkest parts of my mind, never checked my aching bones to make sure they were alright.
you never checked my lungs to see that they were filled with water, never saw my shoulders, the burden they were under.
you only saw my face, readied and pristine, my face constantly smiling whenever i heard your name.
you never examined the backs of my eyes to see what keeps coming back, never checked my spine to see if something makes it crack.
you never checked my muscles, you never checked my heart. if you had dusted it for fingerprints, you would've only found his marks



[this heartbreak hollowed out my bones, and weighs a thousand pounds, it pushed me underwater, but your name, i can't quite drown out. you're trapped inside my head, i hope you do get out, you're the burden i am under, i really have no doubt. if you had checked for fingerprints, you wouldn't have been invested, if you had checked my heartstrings, you wouldn't have been tested.
you failed the science test this time and i'm so sincerely sorry. but if you had checked for variables you wouldn't have had to worry]

when your ex texts you in the middle of the night, "wanna come over?"
tell him
"go **** yourself"
and when the boy who turned you down three years ago because you weren't pretty enough tries to get in your pants, tell him to **** a ****
when the girl you were best friends with in second grade is now too cool for you, tell her that you never liked her anyway
when your mother tells you that you look fat in that outfit, tell her that it's the new trend.
when your father lays a hand on you, call the cops.
when your boyfriend cheats on you, leave him.
when life bites, bite back.

be your own hero, and your own biggest fan. respect yourself. you are worth so much more

its been
six days
since ive seen you
and eight days
since you
have tried to see me
but
24 days
since we've been alone
and
38 days
since i last held you close

i once predicted
when we were happy and together
that if i lost you
it would not shock me immediately
but rather
hit me piece by piece
and that losing you
would slowly **** me
as a lack of happiness in my life
and that's what happened

it's winter break
and i've been laying in bed for the past five days
it's like i need your touch
to sustain me
and i need your words
to get myself out of bed
winter break
where we promised we'd spend
every day together
and maybe i would have gotten snowed in
at your house
(in a worst case situation, of course)
but instead
i'm laying bed
5.9 miles away
from where i want to be
and you're spending every day
with your best friend
and she's beautiful
just like you
while i'm laying here
regretting my decision
of calling it quits
far too early
because i need you

you are full of tears
but that does not make you sad
you can get emotional but you are so much more than a shipwreck
maybe you get upset sometimes but that does not reduce you to a puddle of saltwater

you am so much more than sad.
you are strong, you are intelligent,
you are sweet, you are wonderful.
maybe you are sad but you are also inspiring and beautiful and valuable and unique

do not ever let yourself be defined by an illness. do not let a boy leave you because you are "sad", because you are so much more than a tear on your cheek, you are so much more than ugly crying, you are so much more than smeared makeup and sad is a feeling, not a state of being, not a personality trait.

do not ever let yourself be reduced to just "sad"
and tell that boy to go **** himself because you are so much more than sad

i am tired of talking to adults no i do not want to see a dermatologist or a psychologist or a psychiatrist or a nurse no school counselor i am definitely not having suicidal thoughts and no doctor i do not want to talk about the results of my mental health survey. of course dr. cook i am totally open to the idea of taking an antidepressant dear god i am tired of talking to adults do not want to be diagnosed i do not want to talk about it stop worrying about me, no, 'i am not depressed,' this is my life so thank you for not making me sign a life pact but leave me alone i am not going to cry in front of another strange adult. do not diagnose me. all i want is to be normal, i am tired of the pills. i am done with talking to adults

the smell of old alcohol lingers on my sheets, less potent that of your cologne but it still brings back memories of 2. your face is all i can see in this swirling whirling darkness. 3. i swear i can still feel your hands wrapped around my waist holding me together but they are not there. the only thing you have a grip on now is my 4. heart, beating louder than a runaway train because of cloudy memories of your 5. taste overcoming me. you were so sweet, all that was left in your absence was the melancholy taste of loneliness
i never knew love could be so ironic

what about
me being bulmic?

screaming at you how my brother had caused it
i completely lost it
begging you to open
your ears for a moment
‘bulimics lose their teeth..’
ran up to my room
listening through the floor
hearing how ‘stupid, ’and ‘dumb’
you took me for

one year later
‘wow, its horrible
how skinny she’s gotten.
bulimia, its awful!
doesn’t happen too often
oh, do you know what that is?
its when girls puke themselves
the sickness overwhelms
quite awful, you can tell.
you would never do that,
right, my daughter?
you know better, you’re skinny'
(yeah, we’ve got her)

it’s funny, isn’t it?
what people forget
always the things
you would never expect

there are some who want a thinner waist
and others who just don't like the taste
of food they feel they do not deserve

some eat cake with their eyes
while others are busy planning their demise
one wants to see bones, another, headstones

one could love themselves if they were just 40 pounds thinner
"maybe i'll love myself if i just skip dinner"
the other has no appetite, a battle with calories she does not fight

a battle, rather, with herself
to **** herself or stay in living hell
too preoccupied to care what is on the pantry shelf

there are some who want a thinner waist
and others who just don't like the taste
of food they feel they do not deserve

the world needs more birthdays
the world needs more "today is going to be a good day"
more going for a morning run, or whatever makes you happy
more 'come back, i wasn't done hugging you'
'you look beautiful'
more homemade chocolate chip cookies

the world needs more good

even if it seems bad;
i know it can seem like an awful place to be
but we can make it better
just be good, you and me

we can have more birthdays
and bake delicious cake
we can make life better
just stick around, and wait

when your daughter tells you that she has an eating disorder, believe her.
do not mock her, do not tell her she is wrong. though you could not hear her in the bathroom on her knees at christmas or on her birthday or after dinner, listen to her now.

know that after she reveals this and runs crying to her room that she will lie directly on her floor and place her ear to the carpet and she will hear you discussing her declaration like a bad movie, a critic to the fact that yes she still has all her teeth, but you do not know anything about disorders.

when your son mentions at the dinner table that your daughter thinks she may be depressed, do not shake your head. do not continue your meal, do not let her escape to her room immediately upon mention of the subject. do not shake your head, and do not continue your meal.

when you ask your daughter if she wants to see a psychiatrist and she does not say no, take her. make an appointment, do not cancel it. take her.

after an argument, when your daughter refuses to hug you, do not be offended. do not make a sarcastic remark about how she is "really helping the situation," that will not help the situation either. only know that she is hurt, and that she is only sixteen.

when you buy your daughter acne treatment and teeth whitener and brand new makeup and pore strips and she refuses to use them, do not yell. rather, attempt to fathom why your daughter may be boycotting your unrequested purchases, and try to find three things about her more important to you than her appearance.

when your daughter tells you that last night she sat in her closet for an hour so that she could be safe from you due to the way her her heart races and her palms sweat every time she hears the sound of your footsteps outside of her room, please reevaluate the way you talk to your daughter.

when your daughter tells you that she is sick and that she cannot go to school for the fifteenth separate time this semester, ask her about in what ways she is feeling ill, because one does not contract the flu fifteen separate days over the course of five months. that is not how the flu works. it is not likely that she has been physically ill to the point where she will lay in bed until past the time she was supposed to be getting home from school. do not accept the fact that she has a "headache" and do not let her tell you that she is just fine, because she is not.

when your daughter stays up all night doing homework but does not complete her work, do not nag at her. do not tell her that you and her father are "just waiting for her to have a mental breakdown" or to “stay out of your face when she loses her mind” like you know she will, do not tell her for the twentieth time to get her life together. it will not help her get her life together.

when your daughter tells you that she thinks she may be depressed, listen to her. do not fail to notice the words "years" or "finally".
do not simply forget about it, do not wake the next morning and assume that just because she is at the breakfast table eating her cereal that all is well. do not assume that last night she did not make a detailed plan to **** herself and that the only thing that stopped her was a line of a song, and a boyfriend.

when you notice that your daughter has stopped going out with friends, stopped going to practice and stopped trying in school, do not yell. do not lecture. try to predict what she may stop doing next. but do not yell.

do not say things like that she is “upsetting  your  household” statements like that make it very clear in the head of your daughter that the household she lives in is not also hers, and that you do not want her around. do not make careless statements in front of your teenage daughter.

though you may not know that the most common word in all of her google searches is “depression,” it should not take that for you to realize that she has a problem. though you did not see her ask the internet how many of her vitamins she would have to take until she could be sure she would not wake up, it should never have gotten this far.

do not tell her that you are sorry. it will be too late.

i say that i am
"so done with estrogen"
you might not understand

im tired of the stretch marks
on these sacred double D's
tired of all the boys
who don't take me seriously
im tired of the looks
when i wear a shirt that's deemed too low
im tired of the acne
my young teenage skin shows
im tired that i hate you
and that we can't be close
because you are my mother
it should not be so.
im sorry that i was up at two am
and cried because i have no friends
blame it on my "***"
or whatever you would like
im sorry that it happened, just another part of teenage life

im tired of not being able to walk home by myself
because i'm "fragile," and it's dangerous
im tired that i can't be tall
because i have no *****
and being ashamed of my physical traits
when i really have no reason
im tired of putting on makeup
whenever i go out
using dyed red chemicals
to perfect my pout
im tired of being paid less
than my male counterpart
and being stopped by a glass ceiling
when i try to work
im sorry that im here
i know that i should be at home
caring for some children, or talking on the phone
i just had to tell you
that there's meaning behind my words
when i say that im "so done with estrogen"
im really saying much more

you will have days where you will feel ugly and won't want to even leave the house. days like this are important because you will leave the house, and maybe in the process you'll learn that appearances aren't nearly as important as you think. one day you will grow old, and it will be okay.
2. some days you will lay in bed and cry for what seems like forever and that's okay as long as you get up after and appreciate the fact that you're happier then than you were ten minutes ago.
3. nobody is perfect and everybody fails at something so try not to be too ******* yourself when you do too because it really truly is not going to make you anything but sadder. try, sincerely, to be as happy as you can possibly be. i love you

i hope the ed sheeran playlist that i showed you makes you think of me, i hope you read your stupid dystopia books and remember me reading aloud the back covers, i hope you remember which one was my favorite, i hope you ******* loved it and remember that i always had good taste, i hope your cruise was awful, i hope you know i bought you christmas presents and had to take them back, i hope you know that i was glad for the returned cash. i know that the girl that is all over you is annoying, i hope that makes you miss me because i wasn't, i hope your heart aches like mine does, i hope you're doing worse than i am, i hope you find the letter i wrote you for our six month anniversary and i hope you read it over and over again, i hope you cried this time, this isn't going to end with you making me dinner and us making out, this isn't going to end with me taking you back again, this isn't going to end with me getting hurt again; this is the end.
this is the end.

i hope my shadow follows you through the rooms of your house
i hope my perfume lingers in your bedsheets and my naked body lingers in your mind
i hope that when you look at your backyard, that all you can see is the red hammock that we broke
and we laughed and laughed
i hope you sit in your living room and remember when i counted the fourteen fake candles. i hope you count them and find fourteen and remember when we kissed on the floor
i hope that blonde hairs litter your possessions. i hope that you find them on your clothes, in your car, in your room, for months after i've left
i don't want to be so easy to get rid of.
i hope my voice has stained all your family photos so that all you can see when you look at them is how cute i thought you were
i hope that the sight of your empty passenger seat physically pains you and i hope that every day you feel as if something important is missing
and i hope that that something important is me  
i hope your lips burn bitter with my aftertaste and your hands grow lonely just like your friday nights without me

i want you to miss me
even if you won't

there's a definite weight in my chest. maybe my heart is just made of lead or maybe it's the weight of my regrets pressing down on my ribcage. i'm laden with disappointment, it rests on my collarbones and sleeps on my shoulders, slowly pushing me six feet under.

if i can't make you snort with laughter on your sad days, do not stay with me. i do not deserve you
if i can't make you giggle like a little ******* your tired days, find someone else, i'm begging you.
if i can't even make you smile on the days that you kind of hate me, then i am not the one for you, i promise.

and if i don't have you feeling otherwise on days where you find that maybe you don't want to be alive,
leave me
leave me.
for there is someone better out there for you

you deserve someone who fills your life with color and makes you happier than you ever thought you could be
if i can't be that for you,
if i can't make you feel that kind of love,
leave me
please leave me.
for there is someone better out there for you
you deserve them

without you
i don't sing in the shower
or stay up to late hours,
i merely sleep it all off
but i sleep without dreaming
and love without meaning
my family knows it too well
my words are hollow
and my thoughts will follow
you took the meaning out of my life
i walk along paths
and ache for the feel of your hand on my back
ive missed you forever, it seems, in this cold-blooded world
i toss coins without wishes
and all intentions seem vicious

you knew me the best
and you left me a mess

oh, why won't the sunshine
come out

you said goodbye
effortlessly
you explained
with even breaths
and walked
with even steps
out of my door
and out of my life
i shakily said
"goodbye"
and i smiled
and pretended
that i
would be okay
but it's been five months
and it's like the sun
ceased to attend morning
or the ocean
refused to make waves
and the earth
forgot
how to roll into big beautiful hills
and mountains
and i
forgot
how to wake up and smile
or walk home by myself
i learned
to spend my weekends alone
and put my head down when i saw you
with them
and her
i was no longer them
or her
with you
no longer a tree in the words
but a ****
among pavement
and that was life
without you

t             t    h        t               s   s i m p l y
h         e           i      h           d    c
e      m                n    a        r      a n n o t
r         o             g        t    o        e
e  a r e    s     s              w          x p r e s s

if you could stay,
until together
we slowly waste away
you'd make me the happiest person i knew,

except,
you would insist;
except for you.

both of us would know that our statement were true,
the happiest two that either of us knew

this is the future i dream of with you