A man I don’t know walks up to me at work and hands me a bible, says he’s been watching me, that I look like I could use some help and that I seem upset all the time.

Maybe I'm upset because

At work a man tells me getting high will relax me before *** that it will "make it easier"
A man calls me sugar **** while I walk  to the bathroom
A man follows me to the bus stop and asked for a smile
My uneasy eyes a neon invitation for a catcall
“A woman’s work is never done” whispered to me in the produce section of a grocery store
While I walk to go on my lunch break a man asks if I will f*ck his friend “ You can eat him!”
What’s your name?
I like your hair
What are you reading?
Can I sit here?
You got a boyfriend?
I can bang you straight
Do you need help with that?

I don’t need help from a man when a man is my biggest issue, not even god could fix this.

Pull me apart until I am nothing but bone and stardust
Cut me with your words
10,000 little cuts
Hold be tightly in your arms and beg for me

There is no light here
In the wanting
It is dark and lonely
I am red and raw and angry
I hold my breath until I am just a memory
My bones are not yours
There is no place for you here
I will not catch you
I will not die here

When I die
Scatter my ashes from the tops of great mountains
Watch me finally become a bird
Absolutely free
I will sit in meadows with the birds and the bees
I will become the sun and I will shine down on your sweet freckles and you will know that you are not alone

When I see a woman read a menu like it’s a investigation report I get sad
They search for calorie content and carb counts
Is it gluten free?
Keto?
Paleo?
Elimination friendly?
I think of how unhappy they must be to put themselves through that
comatose your body to numb your mind
It breaks my heart to see little girls excited to go on diets
Boy’s only love skinny girls
That’s a fact
The hunger that rages in their hearts is too much to bar
No one wants to watch a live stream of a woman crying because she is starving herself
Screaming because she gained it all back
People don’t like pictures of women embracing their bodies
That kind of feminism isn’t welcome here
People want detox teas and cream’s that hide stretch marks
Apps for cheat days and tracking charts
Eliminate this to get that
Love is for the thin we all know it
Run this far to reach your dreams
They call it skinny love for a reason
It’s never enough
Just a taste

I remember sitting in a car looking at your wrist
White ribbon wrapped around it
When I asked you what happened the car went silent
All I could hear was that question racing through my mind
What happened?
We were sitting in a grocery store parking lot when I first found out you wanted to die
The sky was blue and we didn’t know what to have for supper
I can’t remember how it came to this
I don’t know why you feel so broken
But now I am broken too
I can still see the exact parking spot we sat in and cried
I avoid it like the plague
Mom was heartbroken
I am heartbroken
You were numb
I was in the back seat of a silver mini cooper the moment I truly found out what heartache feels like
My world crashed around me
At night when I hear you cry I feel like I’m back in that car asking
What happened
When I see the scar on your wrist I think of every sharp object in the house and I want to burn it all
I can’t see a band-aid without thinking about you
Can’t drive over a bridge without counting the times I almost lost you
I wish I could cradle your heart in my hands and make everything okay again
I still ask myself what happened sometimes but now the answer seems even farther away from me
I thank every god
Every leaf
Every tiny living creature that you are still with me
My dear sweet sister
I love you.

A quiet girl looks at herself in her bathroom mirror
She touches her lips wondering where her courage went as she stains them ruby red  
Quiet girl stands on the bus
Not at the back
Never at the back
She watches people stare out the foggy windows
making up stories about them
A doctor
A lawyer
A broken heart
She doesn’t want to be seen only see
Quiet girl stands in amazement at how so many quiet conversations make such a loud voice in her head
Stories of lost loves and newfound adventure make for much better entertainment than a phone screen
She sees a woman weeping not crying
Never crying
Quiet tears fall from her eyes like peaceful waterfalls
Her eyes speak to the girl
She understands
She names the weeping woman
Lucy
Lucy listens to sad music and likes to eat cherry pie
She is a woman of wonderings
A dreamer
She sits at the back of the bus
legs crossed
The girl watches small sounds escape lucy’s ruby red lips like morse code  
Faint cries for help
quiet girl watches Lucy curl herself smaller into her seat as the man next to her expands his hungry reach
Quiet girl watches lucy’s eyes scream so loud she can hear it
She offers her a glance of understanding of shared fear
But this is her stop and she’s late for school
She gets off the bus and watches lucy drive away
She should have known better the quiet girl thought
Never sit at the back of the bus

When the fat vegan says she’s a vegan no one believes her
People offer her chocolate to see if she’ll crack
Fat and vegan aren’t words that coincide
It’s like a pancake covered in hot sauce
Unnatural

When the fat vegan walks into the grocery store to buy some produce people think good she needs it
But fat vegan doesn’t feel fat
She likes her shirt tucked in
Sleeves short
Shorts on
The fat vegan loves apple slices and kale salad long showers and a purple lipstick.

Fat vegan eats what she likes
She feels dainty and light
Finally small
Rightfully at home in a sweatshirt
Fat vegan floats through the world as the woman she longs to resemble
But on the inside
Reality creeps back in front of her only in a side glance in a window,
A judgment from a stranger.

Fat vegan has been taught to fit in not stretch out taking up more space is selfish being loud is obnoxious living a magnificent life is too loud
But fat vegan dreams of endless love and long walks  
She finally learns what love means
Being happy on the inside defiant of the world
She knows how strong she is so she continues to float through the world
A
fat
Happy
vegan

I stopped looking for you in the sun and the stars
you don’t belong there
you will never do them justice.
When I look up at the night sky absolutely mesmerized by the possibility of such beauty I no longer think of you.
You belong on earth, so grounded by your own rigidness that flight is impossible.

Perhaps
one of the saddest things of all is
knowing the love I’ve dreamt of forever
will never come to be
my heart clings to the idea of you more than my hands can hold.

The version of love only a young mind could create and a naive mind could hold onto
every make-believe date
every possible first kiss
every midnight conversation
Yet to come to life.

Maybe it never will.

I hope you don’t because if you do your last excuse just ran out,
If you see me how could you not help me?
I wear my heart on my forehead waiting to be read
Scrubbed clean of all agony.

If you can see my suffering but do nothing
To help then you are just as bad as the rest of the world
I
Would
Help
You
From across the sea I would fly
I would scoop you up into my arms and shelter you from harm
I would hold you close and tell you it will be okay
I would make it all okay
I would help you hold your sorrow.

What doesn’t **** you makes you stronger.
I hope I live long enough to feel stronger,
I hope this was all worth it,
That I truly am a better person for holding onto the hope that tomorrow will be better
Will be easier.

I hope to god it’s true.

I’m not sure I can hold you in my arms
I am scared that you will feel my feverish heart and ask me what’s wrong

Well my darling
The world is just too much for me right now, the weight pressed against my chest each day keeps waking me up telling me to hide
It clings to my soul

To be seen by your bright blue eyes is to be seen by the universe itself and feel all together that I am not alone

My chest against your chest is the closest thing I’ve ever been to weightless
To be whole heartedly understood is to be loved and you my dear are my greatest love

Can you hear it?
that was the sound of all of the air leaving my chest,
The blood from my cheeks rushing to my toes.
I feel like I’m being crushed by some unseen force capable of separating my soul from my bones,
I will never be the same.

This vast distance between us leaves me feeling hollow and alone.
My mind thinks of nothing but you.
My ears don’t hear the warnings about you because my eyes are fixed on yours.
But my heart
The compass that guided me to you is
pounding in my chest telling me
Go
Run
Leave.
The pounding shoots pins and needles through my skin leaving doubt in my mind and a kind of ache that I can only describe as agony.
Do you love me?

All balance is off course.

The silence between us rips us apart as it pushes us away.
When I ask you again
Silence.
Please talk to me
Silence.
I know you are suffering
Silence.
Let me help you.
Let me in.
I know you want to shelter me,
Save me from your past.
But if love knows no bounds
I will endure.
Tonight is different
I need you to tell me to stay,
I don’t want to make this choice alone.
My heart is yours,
I am yours.
Just tell me to stay.

You stand there
Silent
Eyes locked with mine.
I turn away
Silent
I know you want me to stay.
I know you need me to go.
I know you love me enough let me leave.
We both know now is not our time but we still can’t let go.
I can’t let you go.

I wish you did something,
I wish I hated you.
But no love has been lost here, we just need time to grow.
I want to grow with you baby, but you are so quiet and I am so loud.
You need time to write your wrongs and the time is now.

Please listen to me when I tell you goodbye, it’s only for now not forever.
My heart is yours
I am yours and you are mine.
I will not stop loving you as fiercely as i always have.
Our eyes will meet again baby and when they do
Sparks
      Will
           Fly.

I saw you today.
I imagined walking up to you
I thought about what I might say
But I didn’t
I get nervous around you

So I’m telling you now

You hurt me
More than you know
You
Were
My
First
I thought the world of you
That the universe finally sent me someone to call home
Instead of giving me blessing it taught me a lesson
You
Never
Know
Who
Someone
Truly
Is

The boy I thought about for days on end
Talked to all the time
Imagined holding
Had a love already
But never said a thing
The happy butterflies that swarmed in my chest at the sight of you
Turned grey and faded to dust and with it
My
Love
For
You

What do you do when you aren’t sure about a boy?
When your brain and body are telling two different sides of the same story?

Brain:
I like the way he talks “ ladies first” “I’d never lie to you”
He looks like a kind hug and a warm night.
Do you show him who you are or cut him off?
The unknown is such a dark and scary place
Stories of girls with broken hearts and boys with grudges.
What do I do?

Body:
Red alert a unknown boy is getting too close and I don’t know how to feel!
He
Want’s
To
See
Me
What do I do?
He
Want’s
To
Hold
Me
With his hands
His hands.
I want to run and hide.
I want to be in invisible again, the pressure of attention is too unknown. Too close. No boy has ever been this close.

Parents tell their little girls to trust their instincts
Is this fear of the unknown or a warning from within? How do you tell?
Does love feel like a risk of self security?
People describe it as a jump.
Mixed messages and signals all over my skin I don’t know if I hate it or love it.
Is
This
Love
Lust
Or
Loneliness?
He want’s to call me baby, do I want that too?
He want’s to read beside me, is he real?
He want’s to
See
Me
Me
Me.

I wait
Poised and ready for love
But love does not come
Not the safe kind anyways
Books and movies set such high standards people stop trying at all.
Boys speak pretty words when they want
something from you,
Girls scream when they want nothing at all.

They say love will find you when you stop looking
So I stop looking
5
10
20
minutes go by
I stop stopping.
Life is more beautiful looking through the eyes of a dreamer
When love is on the brain a smile is a hello and a thank you means see you soon

Love changes the way food tastes and alters perspectives entirely.
I choose to wait
To wait for love, and in the mean time I will view the world through these eyes of mine
Seeing kindness and hope in all things.

Where I am now and where I want to be feel like they are oceans apart.
Going from lost to found seems easy, but what happens when found is a mystery and lost is the never ending doubt of identity and self worth.

My lost looks like a cycle:
Me finding a spark of inspiration
Chasing it relentlessly
Hitting a wall of self doubt and "reality"
And going back to bed because the weight of the world is too much today.

My lost feels like a collection of ups and downs
Up
what I have to offer the world and the skills that I have will help people.
Down
I am incapable of finding love in this body of mine
People don’t look for inner beauty the way they do in movies, The self worth I feel is a illusion I created for myself because I am alone.

My lost feels like a never ending stomach  ache that I am doomed to have forever.
The body becomes so used to pain it numbs the senses.
The pounding in my head tells me the choices I make will never amount to anything.
I wonder if anyone feels the same way I do
Finding a friend in the darkness sounds nice right now.

Hi, I’m a loud 19 year old self conscious mess who eats a little too much when I’m sad
When I tell you I don’t feel good I mean the storm clouds have rolled in and taken place up in my mind and the tides are washing up over the shore that is my eyes.

When I say don’t get to close it means that I’m too scared to tell you everything I’ve been through right now,
some of the darkness that lives inside of my heart is yet to be explored and tonight that expedition won’t go well.
I’m not sure you want to see all the shades of blue that I've become,
not sure if you’ll look at me the same when you hear the stories I have to tell
so please don’t get too close.

I get embarrassed when people talk too loud in public
don’t ask me why i can’t tell you
I’m a girl who sometimes would rather stay in the confinement of my own self doubt than take one step outside because the anxiety that washes over me when I make eye contact with a stranger makes me want to melt to the ground and sink back into the earth.

I like green tea
I like boys with long hair and  girls with soft smiles,
If I seem a little shy don’t worry that just the voice inside my head telling me how stupid I sound when I laugh

My name is baby in french and that’s pretty funny cause I have a tendency to feel too much
in fact when I cry my dad loves to point out that I’m not in acting class anymore. Well dad that’s a fun fact but I still feel like my heart is exploding so I’m gonna go disappear now.

I’m a 19 year old girl who has seen more panic attacks than flowers and feels more self doubt with my back to a stranger than looking  in the mirror
and Yes I probably feel too much but that's hardly a issue right now.

Like waves against the shore
Thoughts flood my mind filling it with  bitter salt and half truths.
I am not lovable
Not desirable
Not ready to be loved
These thoughts aren’t true but my heart believes them.

Wishful thinking about holding hands and long phone calls ending in i love you.
I see a lover in every pair of eyes that meet mine
The hunger my heart creates shoots through my veins spreading fire through my body
Only stoping when I look in the mirror,
I do not love myself
Not yet.

I am lonely until I see another fight between two lovers
I do not wish to be broken like that
I do not with to hurt like that

I am lonely... I think
Until I see myself and think
I
Am
Enough

I am standing by a window when I say it
I
Can’t
Love
you
Anymore
It doesn’t hurt me like I thought it would.
When something is a long time coming the moment it arrives a strange relief comes with it.

You are not the same person you once were
The boy I loved is nowhere to be seen,
You
Became so angry with the world
you lost your way and yourself along with it.
I stood beside you seeing both black and white unable to see the cause of such sadness but when you told me it all made sense
A young boy with nothing became a man with much more
but the boy remained alone behind closed doors.
When I tell you I can’t love you
You walk away leaving me at the window looking out at the blue sky
I wish I was sad, a love like ours should be mourned.
Neither of us turn around, neither of us say goodbye
It is done.

When I wake
I wake to you and your ocean blue eyes staring at me, like always
My heart fills with joy you see you
My mind relieved to know it was all a dream

Pause
When the force of others assumption filled judgments stop you in your tracks
Telling you
What to wear
How to act
And
Who to love

Breathe
You are not the only one questioning the World right now the questions we have take time to answer but they will come


Repeat
These words
May I be happy
May I be healthy
May I be free from inner and outer harm
May I care for myself joyfully

Take care of yourself

I am tired of hearing these thoughts of mine
Waiting for a miraculous change of body and soul driven by hope and nothing more

The sick feeling lying heavy deep in my chest never passes
It is always waiting for a opportunity to plant doubt and create more sadness    

My own personal enemy

I am a girl lost inside herself

Drowning in my thoughts
held down by my worries
paralyzed by my fears

I am a girl who searches for life long connections in dark and cold places
a unbalanced combination of sugar and spice with a hint of anxiety and notes of don't touch Me I'm self conscious

I look for meaning in words left unsaid and misdirected affections which almost always leave me lonelier that before

My rare moments of bravery overshadowed by self proclaimed failures and regrets I am too tired to carry anymore

I am a girl lost inside herself found floating on the hopes of tomorrow
I am worried about the future and wonder if self exceptance is on the horizon
I wonder if I will have children and if I will raise them right
I wonder if one day I will feel pride in my body
I wonder if I will be okay on my own
I wonder what tomorrow holds

I am a girl who struggles with how much is enough and what is too much
Lost in my dreams and what it means to live a full life

Thoughts defining actions
Wishes defining thoughts
I am a girl lost inside herself

I hope you know I heard you

Every comment said at a hush tone
Every crooked look my way
You
The boy who would rather call the girl you love fat to all of your friends than admit you love her
Too afraid to be honest so you turn to cruelty
The pathetic way out

I don’t have time to wait for you too change
I am too tired to hold onto your insecurities for you so I’m setting them down

I’m putting all of my hurt feelings and doubts on a shelf and letting them sit there
In the morning I will throw them away along with every love letter written and flower gifted

I am going to step into the shower and wash away the feel of you off of my skin
Wash the sound of your voice out of my mind
Rinse the way you smile at me out of my hair
When I am done I will wrap myself in my own love and once again I will be enough
me
a beautiful fat girl standing all alone
But this time being alone won’t bother me

One pillow
Between my legs
I hold it there at night giving myself a false Sense of security and a curve to my spine That says I love you

Two pillow
Wrapped around my arms
The illusion of your sturdy chest
Heart beating
Your skin warm against my cheek
I am safe here with your arms around my hips  
Our legs tangled together like two Perfectly woven pieces of fabric
Heartbeats sync
Eyes slowly close
I love you’s whispered

Open your eyes

One pillow
Between my legs giving me a false sense of security and a strong stiff spine

Two pillow
I wrap my arms around it tight
Wishing you had a sturdy heart
Wishing you were here

But pillow thoughts are always hopeful for things that will never be.

You are not alone
They call us
*****
Intense
High strung
All because they can’t handle us

Our truth is too powerful for them
They tremble and fear our power
So much
That the only way for them to justify their Own insecurities is to put us down

The aggressive girls are the ones with so
Much truth in their hearts that it blinds People who stare with jealousy
The world can not push us into conformity So they try to put us down
Making half jokes so they don’t get in Trouble for what they said
“I was kidding”
“Don’t take everything so seriously”
“It was a joke”
People who hide behind fake laughter Always get put in their place

Remember
When they put you down
Pick at your wounds
Try to infect your mind
You are the one who is winning.

I have grown tired of people telling me about my body
That these little Red lines that speckle my skin should never see the light of day

I have Grown tired of pulling shirts down and pants up
Applying remedies to the red hot blush of my shame

This body of mine
Blessed with the gift of life
Smothered with chemicals designed Tighten
Tone
Erase

For what?

When I come home and wash it all away
I am still left standing here with myself
Red
And
Raw

A girl who was told that to be beautiful and desirable
Little red lines can never be seen.