my skin is peeled off
muscles dragging on the floor
my organs are exposed
my nerves cut and burned
my broken ribs
scattered on the floor

i've been dissected
eyeball lenses popped out
and my beating heart
is right out
in the open

i’m a fish out of water
drowning in the air
throw me back overboard
i’ll be fine, i swear
even if i sink to the bottom
it’ll probably be for the best
i’ve heard that death by drowning
is a good way to get rid of a pest

What do your friends describe you as?

Annoying

”Close your mouth”
“Don’t say a word”
“Whatever you were going to say
doesn’t matter anyway”
These thoughts have run
through my head
around and around
for so many years
Hurtful words I took from
good people:
my friends

I talk too much
just won’t SHUT UP
even when I drill it my head
again and again
that people have left me
because I was too selfish
too open
too ready to tell a story
I just can’t stop
I just keep opening up
I hate myself for making this
pitiful poetry account
there’s nothing worse than
complaining to strangers

I’m sorry
I’m so sorry
I complain too much
I talk too much
I just can’t help it anymore
I want to be heard
and I’ve tried to be quiet for too long

so

I’m annoying
so ******* annoying
always has been
always will be
spilling words and emotions
at any chance I get
By now
everyone around me
just wants me to shut up
they say that they don’t
that like what I say
and conversations with me
are actually really fun

But

That’s what they all said before

how do you do something
that half of your body protests?

how do you leave behind
something that has made you so happy?

how to do you accept
that this will be for the greater good?

i have no answers to these questions
only silence
and decisions to be made

once upon a time
there was a girl
her hair was made of greasy threads
and her face was a horror onto itself
she scribbled on all her mirrors
trying to deny the monster she was
fake smiles and baggy clothes
locking herself in her isolated tower

then

she was told she talked too much
the flowers that flowed from her mouth shriveled
the light in her eyes would quickly die
she stitched her mouth closed multiple times
sometimes breaking free to rant, then cry
bleeding and stitching
bleeding and stitching
the repetition became a comfort by itself
every time she slipped up
it was the same
bleeding and stitching
a punishment she wished only on herself

once people began leaving her
for one reason or another
her mouth said "it's okay I understand"
but her head said it's all your fault
the ugly, idiot girl
ran away from her problems the best she could
stitching and itching
her arms became a red mess
she isolated and contemplated
who was going to leave her next

she loved and wanted
but kept hidden away
blaming every lost friend, every breakup
on her horrendous face and annoying personality

she hated her self-pity almost as much as herself
no man or woman would save her now
she was the only knight she had
and saving herself was too much of a privilege to grant
to such a mistake as her

so here we stand
this girl wasting away
don't pity her
she deserves it
it will probably always be this way

i can never seem to keep close friends
they come and go
almost as fast as possible
so i latch on where i can
taking things faster than necessary

i just want to be loved
but no one ever loves me for long

i am nothing
without the A+
i have tucked under my arm
i have nothing
except my crumpling place
at the top of the class
no good personality
no beautiful looks
no artistic talent
just my grades
arbitrary grades
that won’t mean anything
once i leave school
each number i go down
the closer i am to not needing grades
to leaving school
i feel my heart hurt
because the farther down i go
the closer i get to leaving school
the more it shows that
i am
nothing

hesitating outside doors
deep breaths
in 4, hold 7, out 8
i can’t confront anything
i just hide and wait
not meeting eyes or expectations
holding my breath
for the time when everything
is alone
and quiet
and still

my voice still shakes
i hesitate
when trying to confront my problems
and my harmful actions

sometimes peace only comes
when sitting on my bed in a dark room
when the universe
seems to slow d o w n
a n d  e v e r y t h i n g
a l m o s t  m a k e s  s e n s e

thinking of my future
gives me chills
and i feel
so helpless
and i want to give up
but there’s that part of me
that smiles at a good challenge
the part that can present a presentation
almost perfectly
that part
that’s so small it’s almost invisible
but maybe
it might be growing

confrontation
always makes me scared
i wait for the problem
to go away by itself
i’d rather self-medicate
then make my parents drive me to the doctors
i think it’d be better for everyone
if i let myself fade away like i want
than confront my problems

i can't breathe
there's a crushing weight on my chest
pushing and squeezing all the life out of me

i feel so utterly alone and helpless
desperately trying to feel okay
be okay
but it's so hard
when i'm so alone
so alone

I’ve always joked
that I’m a corpse
with my skeleton hands
always too cold
for comfort
I’ve become
more undead recently
more willing to let myself
waste away
I eat junk
and don’t work out
even though I know
I might as well be killing myself
with how I treat my life
and I think that’s the point
I’ve grown to hate myself
and I deserve to be
a living corpse

it’s comforting to know
the anxiety and pain i feel
is the tide
of the chemicals in my brain

i try to control the ebb and flow
with medicine
and it works, for the most part
i no longer feel like i’m always drowning
but solutions are never that simple
and when the tide rolls in
and i sink under the waves
i remind myself
that i will be okay

when the tide rolls in
it has to roll back out again

my anxious thoughts are
a flock of birds
focusing on a worry
and swarming it
consuming it
and carrying it with them
but now they are
scattered
a storm has come through
sweeping them around
and around
where they are so scattered
they focus no more
and I can’t decide
whether the clear, direct anxiety
or the dull, all-consuming anxiety
is better
but i still hope
the birds soon flock together
again

we: the observers
you: the victims
we can never know the pain
we will try
to understand
to give you love
and support
but that does nothing
you are trapped
trapped behind a glass door of suffering
we look on
but we
cannot
know
the pain

a black wave
that won’t go away
my eyes forget to shut
and my lungs forget to breathe
all i can feel is
The Dread
swirling and reaching
the punishment from my own brain
for nothing

My chest is tight
restriction from an untouchable force
anger
I want to hurt and destroy
bring justice
for every time I’ve been wronged
but this anger is misplaced
towards the innocent
who don’t know any better
so I tuck it away
and it turns inwards
causing so much pain

Eventually
after I’ve tried other things
I have to use physical pain
to make the tension
the frustration
the anger
go away

my anxiety came back
but remixed
with my fear
manifesting as anger

You sl i  p  p   e    d  away
and I didn’t see it
didn’t see you fall
I was trapped by my own presumptions
that everything would be okay
that you were okay
until I heard you
crying out
and
I couldn’t help

I was too late