I'm sorry, but these words aren't going to spin a story from silver or light up stars in the sky
Sometimes, the poems just can't be beautiful

Beautiful is strange in that it has nothing to do with reality and everything to do with the pupils of your eyes
Like when I was little, I knew I was beautiful
Different beautiful than the other girls in my family-
Like a cherub with ringlet curls in the midst of hour-glass princesses-
But beautiful

I grew up a little and it had the opposite effect than you'd expect
Looking at my tall dancer friends somehow made me more stubbornly insistent that I was beautiful too
But differently, I noticed more now
More chest, more cheeks, all compacted into the rough shape of what a girl should be
So maybe more clasically pretty than a beauty

And then the depression, and then I lost weight
And for the first time, I could slide my hands up my sides and admit to myself that maybe they'd all been right
And that I'd been too fat and
Well, if anything good could come out of the depression it was that I was almost beautiful now,
Beautiful the way the world wanted me to be

And suddenly fear coiled around my throat, a viper paralyzing me with the idea that
I could easily fall back to before
A noose, for every time I tried to put food in my mouth

I started spending too much time by the mirror with my
shirt pulled up to my chest
So I could see the wedges of my ribs pushing through, like weeds cracking headstones at a cemetary
So I could run my hands over my collarbones and marvel at their solidity
Ignoring the cold cavern of my stomach and the shaking of my hands
Determining that 1200 calories a day was the recommendation to
lose weight at my short stature,
So I'd eat that, but somewhere in the back of my head it seemed simpler to round down to a thousand instead

You know what they say the difference between anorexia and dieting is?
They say that dieters have a goal in mind, a weight where they'll be happy whereas anorexics...
In my head, there was no goal, just less and less of me for the world to deal its deck of cards on
Because beautiful didn't matter any more and weightlessness was its replacement

I don't want to be like this
I wasted hours online, by the mirrors, shaking of cold and dizziness in my bed
I don't want to be like this
An alien structure of concavity and wasted bones the only end to this path
I refuse to be like this

I don't know if it works that way
But the laws of physics breakdown at some point anyway and so I will defy my own mind
I have watched this threat hurtle toward me, have seen it with through the pupils of my own eyes,
And it doesn't say very good things about my vision if I let myself be pushed to the side
A leaf ripped away by the wind

I will resist
I will feast on my fears
I will reclaim beautiful as my own, and project it, child-like, on every piece of my world

I refuse to be anorexic
And I will savor every taste of this life I can get
Before I die.

My anger comes
In the form of tears.
I control myself
But the tremors take over.

My anger comes
In the form of silence.
I control myself
But my thoughts run wild.

My anger comes
In the form of weakness.
I control myself
But they don't know that.

My anger comes
In the form of control.
Because I know
The havoc I could wreak.

"Shhh....
No one needs to know..."
The razor whispered
To her skin as
It violated her.

Tragedy struck
At just age 13.
My innocence-
Murdered in the rain.
Not the physical rain,
But the rain of my tears.
My story is different,
But just as terrible.
He stole the beauty
Of my soul and heart...
Leaving me dark and alone.
He ripped my confidence
Away with a single tear.
"I love you."
The lie he told
Has made me unable
To be loved.
"You're so beautiful..."
Another lie he told
Has made me unable
To believe this truth.
He ruined my beautiful,
White wings from God.
He replaced them with
Skeletal outlines of what
Once was.
My lovely face has been
Scarred by the streaming
Tears down my face.
Clawing at my skin,
I try to wash away the guilt.
"But the guilt is not yours."
They say.
"It isn't your fault."
"It isn't your fault
That he is an evil man.
It isn't your fault
That he targeted you.
It isn't your fault
That he took advantage
Of a little, naive girl.
It isn't your fault.
It isn't your fault.
It isn't your fault.
*It is not your fault, Elizabeth."

Look, I know
I should just go to sleep
Same as I know I'd get more done if I stopped writing poems
But if I go to sleep now
I'll dream of Death
About how close I can get before our fingers twine and
I can't get them undone
And I wonder if those who choose him regret it
Because it doesn't seem like there's much to regret right now

So I'll write instead of sleep
In hopes that I'll stumble upon some words of my own
That convince me I made the right choice
When I chose    
to stay

You've made me feel
Alive again.
After so many years of
Being dead.

You've made me feel
Safe again.
After so many years of
Crippling fear.

You've made me feel
Happy again.
After so many years of
Excruciating pain.

You've made me feel
Loved again.
After so many years of
Searing hate.

You've made me feel
Something*  again.
After so many years of
Lonely nothingness.

*You've made me feel
Alive again.
After so many years of
Being dead.

A little girl with golden ringlet curls skips up the stone path
Tucked under her arm, she carries a white box tied together with a red, elastic ribbon
Come play with me she pleads, pulling at my shirt
My mind is elsewhere, and though I wasn't expecting a visitor, I laugh and let her drag me over under the big willow tree
She cuddles close, her small heartbeat familiar, almost
Her muddy brown eyes sparkle with excitement
I want to show you my toys she says, pushing her box to me
Open it! she orders
Good-naturedly, I tug at the ribbon
It is tough, almost muscular to touch, but I wrestle the box from its grasp
Only to realize how beautiful the box itself is, a rose and thorn pattern carved into its bone-white ivory panels
Go on the girl prompts
I push off the lid, and smile at the girl before looking inside

The girl claps her hands and laughs as I gag
Acidic tears burning in my eyes
Aren't they lovely? she sing-songs
She shows off her puppets one at a time, squeezing each by their broken strings
And I recognize them all

There is an elementary school teacher, a hunched and frail grandmother, the piano man, that boy from my town who jumped off a bridge,
my dad
All of them so very, very
Dead
My own personal collection of ghosts dangled before my eyes

The left side of their chests are stained rust-red, a gaping heart-shaped wound hacked into the fabric of who they were

I stare at the girl wide eyed, shaking with rage
What are you? I whisper
She blinks up at me and then, I recognize her
I recognize myself
For this little girl is me as I was, before I met the boy,
The boy with endless eyes
Before I met-

The little girl lunges into my face
Baring her small, perfect teeth and red, red lips in a controted grin

He says hi she hisses
And a shiver runs through my veins

She stands, pushing her way beyond the weeping branches of the willow tree, clearly done with me
Over her shoulder she calls the words
You can expect a visit soon
Before skipping down the stone path, box in arm again
Until even the gold reflections of her hair are swallowed by mists

I shudder, wishing I could close my eyes
But I see her box every time I blink, with my dead all meatly arranged in a line-
I go and chase the sunlight
And it gets a little better
I feel safe enough to breathe

But still, in the back of my mind,
I know her warning resonates true
Expect a visit soon

Somehow I'm never ready when he comes.