So, you ask,
How would I explain it?
Well certainly, as something
Not fun.
It's like...
It's like carrying a leach around with you.
When I walk, I can feel it,
It is a dead weight on my chest,
******* the life from my arms,
Making my hands and face slender,
What should be full and strong
It's like...
It's like when you're sick to your stomach.
That feeling of tar in your gut,
But instead of being isolated, it's everywhere
Throughout your body,
It makes you feel sick everywhere.

This is how I explain dysphoria:
Have you ever looked in the mirror,
And wanted to just rip all your hair out?
When a bad hair day gets out of hand,
Have you ever felt the need to just start over?
Even when you tear out a clump of hair
And your scalp looks raw and a little ******,
But you keep going anyway,
Just to get rid of that stupid haircut?
...no?
Alright, how about,
When you're watching the outtakes of a 3-D animated movie,
the scenes that have "gone wrong",
When the girl's eyes are far too big and pop out of her face,
Her arms are disconnected from her chest,
Her head moves but her teeth do not,
And you just want to scream "DELETE IT!"
Because it's obvious that someone has ******* up here,
And this nightmare, this fever dream
Is not what they intended their creation to look like.

Alright, well have you ever
Done a pencil drawing?
And you've put a lot of time and effort into it,
You're so proud,
This is one of your best works,
But something about it is just off?
You might not be able to tell what it is,
This will bother you for a long time,
You will spend hours on end thinking
About what exactly separates this piece of art from everything else,
What it is that keeps it from perfection...
Until suddenly one day, you realise,
You notice exactly what's wrong,
You grab an eraser to fix your mistake
But then, oh no
Your eraser was *****,
And when you tried to rub out that single wonky line,
You leave a huge black smudge across your paper
And now there's no way to get rid of it
All your work on this piece, ruined,
And you're really upset,
You were so proud of this drawing,
It was so close to being perfect,
It could have been so beautiful,
It was almost perfect, but now...

But now, it's wrong.
It just looks wrong
It just IS wrong,
It wasn't meant to look like this
I am trying to explain as simply as I can
That this body is wrong,
That it wasn't meant to look like this,
That it wasn't meant to BE like this!
Don't you understand?
This is how I explain dysphoria:
Have you ever looked in the mirror
And wanted to just rip your chest out?
Do you ever see your body, your parts seeming broken,
Your chest, legs, hear the sound of your voice
And just scream "DELETE IT!"
Because it's obvious that someone
Has ******* up
Someone was using a ***** eraser
When they created me, erased me,
And they've left smudges, mistakes, that I
Cannot get rid of,
And however hard I try to pretend
That I don't care,
I do,
And I still feel the need to erase them.
These leaches that I carry around,
They drain me,
And I was so proud of myself
I,
This body...

It could have been so beautiful

Tick, tick,
Down, down,
the watch beeps
On the hour,
Every hour,
I always hear it,
I go to bed at nine,
And can hear it counting,
Ten,
Eleven,Twelve
One,
Two,
ThreeFourFive
Now I have to wake up in an hour and a half,
I didn’t sleep,
Should I have done something instead?
Maybe done that essay,
Or finished those slides,
I have so much work to do
But I’m stuck inside
My own head, filled with
This fog of exhaustion
And confusion,
Why can’t I just
Fall
        A
               s
                     l
                               e              
                                           e
                                                               p
Instead of
Purgatory in my bed,
But I’m so dreading the upcoming hell
There’s a part of me that
Wants to stay awake,
Live through the hours
Because I’m not skipping ahead
Like a game, I don’t
Skip the night
Since there are things to do, right?
But I’m not even doing anything
Useless pictures fill my head,
Impossible to put into words,
Fantasies of a history
That never was,
A future that never will be
A creature, almost human,
Glowing with a white light,
With a voice that echoes,
Electronic and demonic
Keeping me awake,
My god, why can’t I dream properly,
In half-remembered fragments
Like my living nightmares
All seem to be...

Turning the alarm off at 6:30,
I realise I haven’t slept at all
I groan and roll over
Then get up.
We have work to do.

I walk through the doors,
Present the child with a tiny badge,
Yellow, white, purple, black.
I watch the smile spread across their face,
As I call them
"Captain; dear; Mx. Eli; child"
Do not tell me that they are not real
Do not tell me that they are confused
You have never known the inner workings
Of the mind of a child,
You dictate their thoughts and dreams and imaginary friends and fathers.
They are not confused
They know their mind
And they know the world they will grow up in
Will be nothing but cruel to them -
Nothing but cruelty to the little lost boys and girls and neithers,
Because if you cannot experience it then it must not be true,
And you must make up lies you imagine your father must have said
From his passive, uncaring position in the clouds,
Watching drama unfold like a game of Sims.
Tell me I'm going to hell. I'll see you there.
And never talk to my sibling like that again.

She has built your memories out of lies,
Screamed at you countless times,
And for every hurt she causes you,
tells you it is your own fault
You were raised to be co-dependant,
and then punished for not being independant
You burn books out of frustration
and shut out the world
because you've been "taught" how much more dangerous it is
than your own cage of a house
This fire she continues to twist around you,
Igniting unprovoked anger,
Because you dared to bend a rule she breaks every day,
Lighting up the trail of gas
and burning your memory away,
She birthed you to be her puppet,
and when you wiped the half-done paint job away
she tortured you into submission,
For all the lies she forces you to listen
Maybe we've solved the puzzle of her constant lies,
but it doesn't matter.
she doesn't matter,
but you do.
And I tell you now,
You won't have to listen to her lies
forever.

Climb this mountain,
Don't tell her what her voice is

Climbing, I don't say,
When she calls out, she's joking,
She's not talking to me,
But if I imagine she is,
Watch me sprint up.

This euphoria,
I've only felt it once before,
When I was called little brother,
And these two words embraced me
So small, yet holding so much,
She might have been joking,
But what I heard was
I hear you,
And I almost cried

Now, climbing,
I don't say
I don't tell her what her voice means
I doubt she remembers
What I whispered in urgent tones that day
Because I know she isn't talking to me,
When she calls to the boy,
I know she's talking to
the real boy,
But when I heard her,
I soared up the cliff,
Exhaustion from the hours before
Suddenly gone
And I could run, like
Any boy could have,
Now I find myself dreaming
That she might mean it one day,
I find myself dreaming
That the boy she was talking to,
Really talking to,
Might mean it one day...

If I was looking for beauty
I wouldn't look in the mirror.
If I wanted to see a pretty perfect face
I'd look at some cousin's old dolls.

If I was looking for perfection,
A face unspoiled and clean
There would be a thousand places I could look
But I will never look at myself

If I'm looking in the mirror,
I'm looking at an injury
Or a stain,
Or a wound
I never see anything remotely beautiful in the mirror
Not unless someone's standing next to me
And it's funny,
People have called me beautiful before
Only for me to snort so loudly
For me to laugh in genuine confusion
And sarcastically agree.
I don't call myself modest
I'm simply asking for honesty
I've never cared about
What my face looks like
How ugly I am
or how pretty I'm not
Surely, there's something more important
To compliment someone with
All a face is
Is a way to recognise a friend
All a body is
Is how to describe the guests to expect

The only disadvantage to not caring
Is that I doubt I'd care
If something were truly wrong.

My
Thin blue lines
Are the targets
For your cries
Can’t think
For how sick
We made ourselves.

My
Thin blue lines
On my hands and wrists, I’m blind
Remove my sight,
Remove my eyes
Take my ties
And cut my lines,
My thin blue lines

Dropping constant lies,
Everything’s fine
Constant false smiles,
I’ll be on time
Tomorrow, today
Always
Keeping away,
Can’t say different,
Won’t it be brilliant.

My
Thin blue lines
On my hands and wrists I’m blind
Remove my sight,
Remove my eyes
Take my ties and
Cut my lines

Seething, livid gaze,
Look through a haze
Constantly fired,
Easily liars
Tomorrow, today
Always
Keeping away
See red so easy,
Can’t say you’ll see me

My
Thin blue lines
Are the targets for my cries
Can’t think
For how sick
We made ourselves

I wear a jacket that looks like patchwork
I dress in a shirt that's far too tight
Because it makes me feel different
Because if I wear this then
It's like I'm hiding my skin
It's like I can get lost in
This long pointy hood
These orange and purple patches
I'm not wearing my confidence today
Can't you tell?
Yeah I know, I've been told
Confidence is a good look for me,
but
I'm not wearing confidence.
I'm not wearing the salt
Or the pride
No
I left that in my other jacket pocket
And I'm shaking too much to get it out now

I'm here
In a black shirt I said I'd never wear
I'm here
In a hoodie that still smells like dust
Because I guess it's better
Than any coat that stinks of lies
And I can turn on my screen
And listen to bitter truths in
Gorgeous symphonic language
And I can paint
These tiny colourful stripes
Onto bottlecaps
Looking away
Because it's too real
Please, this is the only reality
I need to be a part of,
Let me read my soul
If I can't find the way to draw it
Let me turn it into a song
Turn it into something
Worth listening to
Because hell knows I've had it
With yelling at a people
Who still just turn a deaf ear,
A blind eye
And now I'm at the point
Where I'm hiding in a patchwork jacket
I'm hiding in this long pointy hood
My skin behind a shirt too tight
Because there's no use arguing my case
When it's already been decided who's right.

Another world, where the stars fly by in scores of showers
And the ocean is cursed with memory that the land cannot keep
Our players enter the scene aboard the Lady Misfortune,
Drowning their toils & allowing the world to drift past.

Until the day black and blue dressed hands drag their nails through the dawning sky & the Sun is sent spinning,
Struggling to protect its precious pet world

Seventeen-year old boy
With oestrogen caught in his chest,
With flags that he wears like a crest,
Defining his torture with pink and blue stripes
Boy,
Hiding in plain sight

Sixteen year old "girl",
Asked what she wants for her birthday,
Lost for words, she has nothing to say
"On my birthday I want to not
Feel dysphoria" Replies filled with sighs and a nod
Girl,
Faking her smiles,
Pretending she's fine
When she hears the word "Girl"

Ten year old "boy",
He's sick of hearing the difference,
Sick of the snickers and whispers that call him
"Tomboy"
As if he's only half-trying
As if he doesn't hide, crying,
He doesn't know who he is,
But he's sick of criticisms
Because
He's not girly enough,
But not boyish enough,
And everyone insists, one day you'll grow up
And you'll be a real girl
A n d  
           I
Was, for a while,
I learned how to smile,
With genuine contentment, I thought
I am enough...

But then I grew up.

Violence plays over the headset
Disguised as love
Keep your head ******* on
Looking down from above
And I'll wait for the lines
To shrink, with my anxiety
Keeping my eyes from the map
I'll look up and I'll sigh
Always a better
Singer than writer,
No dancer, you're a fighter
Scribbled messages written in a language
You might as well have made up
Red pen, endless ciphers
Scratched on loose leaves
Black triangle, purple stripes
So eager to please
We're leaving in an hour
Someone coughs, they can't breathe
Just run through the play in your head
About the different families all needing to grieve
Just remember your lines
Just remember all the scenes
Just hope her leg gets better
So you won't be forced to leave

Me, I'd love to go
Take me anywhere
Take me anywhere but here
Coz I flicker between these
Two locations
Can you let me exist somewhere else
Give me the excuse I need
To get away
Screams,
Turn them into music
Silence
Into white noise
Anything's better
Coz solitude's only so great
In the same place every time
So give me places
Places I can know
And love
Give me scenes I can memorise
And let become part of me
Coz I've got these two locations
I flicker between them
These two states of mind
I flicker between them
I'm asleep
Or I'm running
Give me another place
In my mind and
In the world
Sister, take me
Ride our pink and blue bikes
Any manner of places
Coz you know the city back-to-front
And me,
I flicker
But when you take me
I've got something new
And I've got another state of mind
Coz stress can become excitement
Coz running can become dancing
Coz sleeping can become laughing
If you know how
If you know where
And if you stop yourself
From flickering
Between two worlds
That just
Feel
The same.

Tick, Tock
You listen to the drone
Of a fan
Music ticks by
Three minutes, Thirty-seven seconds
Four minutes, Thirty-eight seconds
Five minutes, Ten seconds
Stop
Alt-tab away
Think about something else
You can't listen to this anymore
Fan drones on
Laughing in another room
Someone plays piano next door

Do something, DO something!
Look at downloads
Four hundred and sixteen
Out of
Four hundred and Fifty-three
Time equals
Distance over Speed
Numbers that go forever,
Listen to the story
"Today's going to be a good day"
And write the numbers coming up on the screen
Just to do something
Seven-Eight-Two-Eight-Point-Five-
Seven-One-Four-Two-­Nine
And papers build up around you
It's the same calculation done
Every 10 minutes
Because 35 Kilobytes per second
And you're exhausted
But you need to do something
That isn't hearing the same music,
That isn't playing Solitaire
Over and Over and Over
Watch numbers go up
Write numbers going down
Two hours, Thirty-Five minutes
Two hours, Twenty-Three minutes
Two hours Seventeen
Two hours Ten
Fifty-One

Four-Twenty-Nine-Point-four
Out of
Four-Fifty-Three

Tick Tock
The drone of a fan
The music's stopped
Someone next door has stopped playing piano
Stare
Into the space on your paper
More space
To fill
With numbers

Outside, a gale is blowing
You tell yourself,
"I'm safe in here"
When you know you're leaving tomorrow
Find yourself wondering,
Will it be a breath of
Fresh air at last?
Or will it just be
Another attack on your lungs,
Another series of spasms in your arms
In your legs,
In 5 hours of being trapped
In a white metal box
Will you be as fine as you have over the years?
Or will you break
As you did only
Days ago?
Breathe deep before closing your eyes
See, again, procrastinating to sleep
Just to trick youreslf into
Thinking the morning's come slower
A blue fan covered in flowers
A keychain with a silver skull
You've never had a problem
With being in your own world
But what happens if
They take you out
Put you
In the spotlight
When you're busy hiding behind a book
Coz you don't mind attention
When you're dressed for the stage
But lately, you've been dragged to performances
In your PJ's
And people wonder why you start panicking
People wonder why you got nothing to say
People think, "What do you mean, you're not ready? -
"Aren't you supposed to be the confident one?"

White shirt, grey lining,
Cotton and spandex binding
This skin, to make me feel whole
You can see I'm half-alive,
My demise I fantasise
Your restrictions are a chain on my soul
I know what my needs are,
Despite your laments.
This second skin will see me through
Your baseless arguments

Don't try to explain to me
All the ways I'm due to burn
Because I've seen enough of that
In this world alone
And I should know,
I don't need your help
Your king will march me into hell himself
And I will greet you at those fiery gates
It seems neither of us could rise above our hate
When my people enter, I will greet them all by name
See, our circles hold a special kind of fame

Among the lucky ones,
Blue, pink and white
We'll be torn apart if they see us,
So it's easier to hide
But how do you hide when your disguise
Is a poison, a pain so deep?
An uphill Battle, hauling lead,
Why D'you think so many accept defeat?
Don't deny us our medication
You're causing more asphyxiation
I have but one consolidation:
That this is my problem
And not yours

Spend the afternoon
Listening to the same songs
Coz you're feeling the way you are
And you can't seem to change yourself
Spend the afternoon
Listening to the same songs
And you find yourself thinking about
Those who think
You owe them your secrets
Those who think
You owe them your friendship
Listening to the same songs
Till you find yourself thinking about
Where they'll be in 10 years
Till you find yourself thinking about
Everything you never said to them
All the **** they threw in your face
And how badly you wanna throw it back
But that requires talking to them
So you shut up
Listening to the same songs
Till you've memorised the words,
"Does it cross your mind to be slightly sorry?"
And picture yourself screaming it
Screaming it to them
Like you owe them your secrets
Like you owe them a world
Why?
Age-old mistakes,
Before you knew that about him
Age-old mistakes
Before you knew it'd throw your life away
Before you knew he hated
"People like you"
But he doesn't know it yet,
He doesn't know it yet so
You find yourself thinking about
What you'd say
And how you'd say it
Maybe think of a song and dance
Maybe end it with a slap in the face
Maybe write him another ******* poem
When hell knows that was your biggest mistake
The first ******* time
And now you look at his face and think
HOW
How in the name of Hell
How in the name of every diety,
In or out of existance, could you
Befriend someone
Like that?

And you find yourself crashing
And burning
Like all of them did
And you think,
am I really better than them?
And sweetheart, then you pick yourself up
And you spend the afternoon
Listening to the same songs
Coz you're feeling the way you are
And the answer is
They got nothing on you
Use your anger,
Put yourself back together
However the hell you can
And keep going
Coz any bridges you burn on the way
You didn't need them
It killed you to keep the stupid things
Up for so **** long
And yeah, you can swear on
Everything you love
And hate
That the next time he shows his face
You'll beat it into the ground
Or write a song and ******* dance
When you know all you need to say
Is tell him how much he must hate you.
After all, look at what you are.
He hates people like you,
Right?

Messy, messy, messy
Crowded

Blurry, faded together
Endless piles of to-dos,
Crockery piling up
I just need-

My head
to let me work
I just need to be left idle
please don't leave me idle
I just need-

Just need to be kept busy,
If I can be contorted into
a constant state of distraction
then Everything will get sorted,
Everything is a distraction,
so I can get lost in Everything,
I just need-

To be left alone
for long enough
that I can explain how I feel about
everyone around me,
so I can go through the motions
of everyone's problems,
& Get back to them when I've figured it all out,
I just need-

Don't leave me alone
not for a second,
I can't be trusted,
& it's too loud in my head
when the world gets
q u i e t
Don't ever let it get
q u i e t
I just need-

Help

Bright red badge says "panic"
Pin it to your chest,
A glowing little crest
Of all their comments,
All their lies
Hide beneath a hood,
Convince yourself it looks
More neutral like this
Coz it's too early in the morning
I'm too tired to imitate
A deeper voice

Raise your demi-demi-god into the sky,
Follow him, follow her, follow them

I never realised we belonged
To the inside
Of the other side
Help your friends hide
In the centre.
"Boy", "Girl",
Taunting yourself in the mirror

Raise your demi-demi-god into the sky,
Follow him, follow her, follow them
Keep walking, honey,
You thought we were just
Following blind
We've stumbled into that ditch before
It's a long way down
Well, we're here for good now, right?

Pray to every diety
That stupid story
Won't play out again,
Can't let it play out again
Well at least she'd know, they'd know,
At least they don't take thieves
For showmen

Chemical imbalance
I can't stop myself being sad,
Maybe I always will be,
But I know I'm getting better;
I've stopped saying that I want to die,
Because I don't.
I've stopped saying I'm the worst,
Because I know it's not true anymore.
I've come back to joke-bragging.
I'm happier.
I can say I'm amazing at writing,
I can take any mundane description,
   And I can make it read like fantasy,
   Like dreams
I can tell you every which way my confidence points in,
I learn like wildfire and don't forget easy,
And this isn't even arrogance yet,
Because I'll always know the difference.

I'm not always happy,
But I'm getting better
I might not be stubborn enough to
   Always push myself further
But I'm taking the steps,
With or without the chemical help I relied on for a year,
Even if that was the only year I found happiness in

There's a spider
On the window
Above my bed
He doesn't move
And all the angels in the world
Would think this
As an excuse
To not sleep tonight
I roll over
He's not what bothers me tonight
Anxiety keeps me awake
And I wonder if
the spider's sleeping well
Or if
He's as sleepless as I?

What would it be
To live on a wall
To lurk in the corner
Of a tiled room
When I go to have a shower
Why does he run towards the water?
Do I think
his life is
As hard as the people I know?
If he's so desperate
He'll run towards flowing water
Does he want to end it too?

Breathing heavy
Bad dreams
Anxiety keeping me awake
Just to procrastinate
Waking up in the morning

Do spiders have nightmares too?

As I sit, slouched over,
Lady in the black dress tells me,
Sit up
Breathe in slow, now
Into the cup full of water,
The fog in plastic
Like the fog in my head,
Remember what they keep saying,
Someone thinks they're hated
And you don't have the words to correct them
So let that poor boy
Walk away, rejection
Like poison in his heart
Remember my nickname was "poison"
Left arm is limp and dead,
It hurts to pick up anything
Rise and lean on the table,
No,
Don't touch anything
Leeches on your chest,
And everyone keeps noticing,
"My girl"
And the words echo in
A hollow plastic mind
Filled with fog as the water is drained
Hair pulled back or hanging over the eyes
Well either way will stop your breathing
People keep asking, "are you okay"
And lies are just so easy,
Too easy,
Mumble in as many words,
Fine, it's fine,
Pray to hell they don't tell her
She can't know, can't know
Brings you to tears just
Thinking about forcing as many lies again
I'll look in the mirror but won't say,
I don't say "smudged drawing" or "failed graphics",
I see dead weight,
I beg them,
Don't make me take this off,
Don't force me to look at all,
Please

Someone has to ask, is this
Nothing but a game to you?
Have you noticed, in this circle of sad songs,
There's only one composer with a dry eye
All you seem to want to do is help,
but here we are atop this mountain,
And we can't tell if your
    Cracked, broken voice is a ruse -
Is it any wonder
We dubbed you a monster,
The only one in control
At all the wrong moments -
Can't you lend us some of your
Stone-faced, clear mind
So that next time we break,
No-one can see it,
Can you help us be more like him?

I don't remember being 3 years old
But I do know what he was like -
A puppy, bouncing around,
A prince in his very own castle.

I vaguly remember being 6 years old
I know what he was like -
They said he was getting old for a dog
He was always grumpy, but at least he
Remembered who I was when I came,
The old king of his castle.

I remember being 12 years old
Visiting again, that Jackie
"He's an old man now", they said
He was tired sometimes
Yet he still acted like royalty in his house

I remember being 15 years old
We were on holiday together,
His owners and my family
He slept often, and was bitter in his years
And I told them,
"You know Jackie's as old as me?"
I calculated that in dog years,
He was about a hundred and five

I am 16 years old, approaching 17.
And Jackie's still here.
He's tired and he doesn't really move much from his seat.
But this is still his house as much as anyone else's.
He'd be 112 to 119.
He doesn't argue when I go to pat him now
He's calm,
Like he's got no fight left in him.
And it's funny,
I can't help but feel he might outlive me
I know he hasn't been this welcoming since we were both three.

Listen to the birds in the morning
Take advantage while it's still cold outside
Go for a walk,
A run,
Just to leave the house
Before the day hits 40
Your eyes still droop
But you ignore the pain in your legs
That came from lack of use
The songs in your head
Replace them
From the bittersweet and violent
To celebration and victory
As you lie in your bed
Thoughts still racing
With the battles in another story
That isn't yours anymore
Right now
You haven't seen the sky so blue
In so long
It hasn't felt like autumn in months
So go out
While this world
Is still cold enough to hold you

Broken, shattered, replying with silence& shrugs to Earnest enquiries,
Surprised when my handwriting doesn't look indecipherable
I find myself talking to
The one person here who doesn't reply with "I feel the same".
Because,
How many broken parts can swim together
In this ocean notorious for drowning little lost boys & girls & neithers?

I'm having the same breakdown she is...
You'd think I'd be able to help her.
The realisation that I can't sets in &
There follows the waves and currents
That twist around me, drag me by the ****** wrists down,
And my head submerges before I get a chance to scream -
"Worthless; Idiot; *******; Someone, **** me" I am drowning,
Someone, help me...

I do not signal.
I watch, as she is crowded into recovery -
By the people who have worth,
Who do not lose their voices in times like these.
I make no sign as she swims to the shallow end,
As she talks about her dreams,
The future she wants,
She will have.
And I am happy for her.

She does not know she must have pulled me in deeper with her thrashing,
And so I remain silent
So as not to pull her in again.
If silence is violence,
As we all know it is,
We must all have convinced ourselves
That we are each,
Individually,
The only exception.

With the songs stuck in your head,
Darling, the clock ticks down to midnight
Now, birthday boy,
Day’s over and we’re still here,
Still typing, tapping away
Like we’re running out of time
Lady, get that song out of your head-
Song out of my head-
Song out of our head
Let’s reach a compromise here
You’re not alone and never were
I don’t know how I let you think that
See, some people, they see this
As an invasion of the mind
Remember the story you told yourself,
As we finally fell asleep…
The story of the lies we kept together
Long after you were dead,
But not really dead? I don’t know, I never could tell
The crowds, the man dressed in a smirk,
Saying oh, what a shame,
to lose your sister like that
And for her tiny voice to answer,
that’s not the way I see it

Remember the defence in her throat,
The anger she gave out
To he who threatened you, and for what?
Arguing his case of a friend long dead,
That’s not how it happened,
But she’s never coming back, she doesn’t even want to
Trust us, she’d prefer it be me
Standing in her place here,
As if it ever mattered who she’d be…
But you see, the story you tell
Is a hundred years old or more,
They’d never perceive you as human again,
For all you know, still don’t.

So you sit here today,
Scared to let anyone know,
Dreaming of a time where we don’t have to be.

Streamline yourelf
Make it feel real
Coz the world in your head
You're too tied to it
Honey
Let it go
Let the worlds
Dissappear
Coz sweetheart
You need to concentrate
Keep it together
For a night and
One more day?
Honey, please
You can sleep when you're at home
And yeah
You can walk down that street and say
This ain't home anymore
But you'll still look at your books
And be too tired to pack 'em up
Darling, for now
You're stuck here
'Til you get out
But it isn't really that bad
Just look at what's here
Look,
you can fight that dragon
Another day
Honey you're fine
You're fine here
Just keep breathing
Until you walk down that street
And wage war with yourself
Again
Oh, look at your mess
Lady
Why are you only kind to yourself
In your poems?

What’s the difference? The first time, this time?
Well,
The first time, it was all I could see - her body, pulsing before me,
I was there,
When she fell,
I was alone,
And I had to leave before I knew she’d be okay

This time, I wasn’t right there - I mean, I was close
But all I heard was the crash and then my own voice I think,
Screaming,
No, no, oh my god

Both times, there was the numbness,
The need to do something useful.
The first time, it was staying by her
The second time, it was running, finding the street names,
Standing by the caller & making sure people would come to help them
But I couldn’t help them

Both times, I was scared by how calm I was in the moment -
I didn’t cry,
I didn’t break down.
I was functional, I think,
I could still think

The first time, I was slow, walking home
I had someone to blame,
Convinced myself we had been abandoned & she was there for longer than she could have been,
But I have no way of proving that

The second time.
I feel strange.
I don’t know what I feel.
Walking home was a mess of emotions,
Every car that passes, a challenger approaching,
Engines, roaring, raring, raging, ready, oh I am so ready,
BRING IT ON!
Headlights taunting, flashing,
And hard footsteps, running, stomping,
And finally reaching the front gate, feeling nothing.

And I still don’t know if they’re okay.

You are my heart -
     Listen to yourself beating
Be careful how fast you go
Sometimes,
     You're a little faster than
          I'd like to be,
So I say, "slow down"
     So I don't miss anything
     Because you are everything I don't want to miss
My chest rises when you take to the skies -
     I try to calm my racing heart -
But I can't seem to slow you down.

Broken pivot
Endless fidget
Back and forth,
Back and forth
Back and-
Back and-
Back and-
twitch
Slam down
In and out
Purple thread
Through black ribbon
In and out,
Back and forth,
Thread snap
Little knife
To Cut the ties
And into skin,
Back and forth,
Thick blue lines
Hiding behind
Skin barely transparent
Needle goes in,
Out
Press the button
Up,
Down,
Hinges swinging
No control
Concentrate
Skin is fabric,
Black nylon
On peach vellum
In and out
As string appears
In dotted lines
Pinch to keep together
openings,
Eyes, lips, ears
A wound in a dress
Keep it together
A hole in the flesh,
Into a scar with time
The aches of a button-up
Dotted scarf
Black ribbon
Stitched together
Around the wrist

See those marks on your arms?
See how I haven't
Been able to look
Under my own shirt
Because you know sometimes,
It just doesn't hurt,
I can't make it hurt enough
I wrote
What I thought was the most explicit
Explanation
But only one person heard
And she thought
The word choice
Was "cute"

This thing isn't working
Can I take it back?
This skin isn't working
Can I peel it off?
This life isn't working
Can I quit and start over?
See, you asked me outright,
And all the words were there but I couldn't put them together
Couldn't string these
Loose musings
Into unity
Enough to form a sentence together
I thought
I was supposed to be good at this?

responsible, can't leave
Selfish?

Am I selfish for not wanting to leave?
Or for not wanting to stay?
Because no-one would notice, let alone care -
Except maybe her, and her,
And maybe him,
And them, and -

And I'm still learning guitar,
And I haven't checked my emails,
And it's not fair to leave without cleaning my room first,
And, And, And,
And that rock would name me incorrectly,
And I'd still be called "daughter",
And I haven't looked up those artists yet,
And I want to learn all the words first,
And, And, And...

I can't stop thinking about how they'd all react
And I can't seem to imagine it would bother anyone for long
Please,
I just need someone to tell me I'm wrong

The skull scribbled on paper
Turned into a tapestry
Of insanity
Look at blank canvas
Stop thinking and just
Draw
When you look again,
It's split in half
With demonic grin
And crying false smiles

Red and orange
Glowing eye
Music coloured in grey
Diamonds in the sky
Covered in leaches that
Distort them into
Water tinted blue
Dried out broken lungs
Brown from lack of air
A little fire starts
And something red
Drips
From the teeth
Of this demon

Blacked out
Closed eye
Crying
But still grinning
Blue and green
Twist and entertwine
A little monster in the corner
With a horrific face
Flipped upside-down
To make a smile?

"Insane" written in purple
Splashed across its face
Breathe out
Look at what you've
Created

They've always made me anxious,
I don't know how they work,
& The sun is impossibly golden,
Sinking with hope, eternally out of reach.
I can't
I can
Breathe

I can't
I can
Do this

I don't know
Don't need to know
Where I'm going

I'm going to get
On the ******* bus
And I'm not going to panic

Telling stories, sitting around a table
Orange chairs, fake wood
I thought a library was supposed to be quiet
Space book, Notebook
Writing as we go
Stories about each other
Maiden and Prince dancing together
Broken lightbulbs around our heads
Angry about broken Aeroplanes

Telling stories, standing in the courts
Brick walls, broken windows
The game gets louder and louder
Green book, Broken pen
Writing as we go
Stories about our lives
Did you watch the news?
Have you seen my flag?
Happy for you, congratulations!

Telling stories, waiting for the train
Long day, cushy seats
People glare, teenagers they mutter
Sketchbook, Notebook
Writing as we go
Stories about our days
What did you do last?
Did you get the notice?
Tired, can we go home yet?

We tell stories
We live stories
But where does each one
End?

It was too long
It didn't make sense
It didn't suit the tone
It's the only one that fits.
No-one else
Needs to know
How much this was cut down
& Edited in post.

We are allowed,
Into the places we have earned, well worth the work.
Did you hear the news? We’re ready to fly,
We can do this, I have faith in us,
Because there is no alternative.
Our morning, and our journey,
Has hardly begun.

That was just under a year ago now,
I remember being disappointed with what I eventually found,
But I remember flying.
I remember singing,
I remember them singing -
Their beautiful voices echoing
up the mountain, and out,
out into the horizon,
to wake the rising sun.
I miss them,
I miss them all.
I seem to have many families.
There is the one scattered, around the world,
where we meet to play games,
drawn together by the torment we endured
& the alliances we rely on.
And there is this one,
Who flew with me,
Up the melodies of the mountains and
Through the dark, silent pleading
of a dangerously calm ocean.
But we don't talk about that,
So I won't talk about that.

Grey walls, grey floors,
Automatic sliding doors
Green lights, follow, follow,
Obedience was all they know.

He couldn’t remember the rest.
We couldn’t remember resting.
We stood in the dark,
In something similar to that long-dead fantasy,
And we build a new one.

He dances.

His blue hair twists around him,
Stark yellow sunlight spills from cracks in the floor,
And as if lifting great weights from the ground,
His arms raise glowing screens from below us,
We stare in wonder,
He spins, slowly,
His figure moving to a beat only he can hear,
Then the light pulses before us,
Steadily flickering and growing brighter,
Writing appears,
His illustrations appear, his character transforming,
Then he rises into the air,
Metal strings, cords,
Wrap around his torso,
lifting him,
The rafters hold him fast,
And he calls down to us -
It's easy!

One by one,
We all start spinning,
More great light shields surround us,
And, flying,
we follow him to the ceiling.

The strings, twisted, tangled,
Dipped in wax & hung & mangled
Dripping, hot & molten, eaten, fraying
Thoughts lit up & lost

Don’t you like this game?
Don’t you want to play?
I write essays on the things that drive me insane
Wish i could show you but I’m too scared to burn you
My bones protest but I can’t bear to hurt you
I can’t have you recoil again, not after
The dance it took to bring you here
Yet you reject me until you bring me laughter

The strings, twisted, tangled,
Dipped in wax & hung & mangled
Dripping, hot & molten, eaten, fraying
Thoughts lit up & lost

The wick is afire, it burns, it burns
The wicked desire to hurt, it burns
It’s screaming & engulfing & it’s crawling up the walls
Surrender to the dance, consumption
Beautiful, twisting destruction

Canvas bag, swinging
As we walk,
The thousand voices
Singing together, screaming
But never loud enough
Never loud enough to stay above water
On our own here
It’s an ocean we used to play in,
Don’t assume I was always a strong swimmer
I never learned to slow down,
Now I’ve stopped moving and can’t
Seem to start again
Keep up, keep up,
Can I really separate myself from the moment
When everyone ran ahead,
And someone collapsed, unbreathing
Can you imagine what would have happened
If no-one had waited for us,
Would we still be in that forest,
Screaming for help
While she was unable to even
Open her eyes,
Everyone tells me I can forget,
But how can I,
When I haven’t even seen her face since that day?
Still, I sit here in silence,
I’ll tell her story another day,
But for now,
The ocean’s feeling a little lonely,
And someone said that others had been here before
Didn’t he say that the ocean was full?
I wonder if I’ll ever meet my fellow dying.

Panic, panic
hold it together
When your bones don't hold together
And you break
See yourself
Watch yourself
fly across the room
no, stop
No, stop!
Hold yourself honey
Breathe,
Breathe,
B r e a t h e
You're fine, you're fine
Hold yourself together with
String,
Hold yourself with muscles you
Wish were stronger
You wish you were stronger
Your hands shake and
clap
Anything to keep them under control
You're drawing,
You're taking notes and then
your pen, it's buried in
Someone else's lap
How'd it get there?
Hold yourself
Hold yourself
How many people struggle
In an arm wrestle with themself?
Now sit down
Sit down and breathe
Coz you've noticed it happens
When you panic
So
Breathe
You're fine,
You're fine
You can handle this
Right?
Sit down
Listen to the music
Focus, focus
You need to pay attention
You look at the guy sitting next to you
And feel your arm move
It isn't you moving it
So you hold yourself
Hands in your pockets
You're crazy enough without this
So keep yourself down honey
You're fine
You aren't flying across the room
Not yet
Your bones hold you together
Like string
Like thread
You're fine
Anything, to keep you under
Your own control
Lady
Breathe
You're fine

You're fine

I'm fine...

...right?

Such quiet,
Soft voices
With such power in their words
That I cannot find my own
Yet when they finish,
A cute smile
And whispered thanks
While I just colour in
Unable to stay
Between the lines
In this dark watercolour
In purples and blues
And bruises and scars
Stand outside
With wooden flowers
With rotten apples
Swinging heavy from the tree
A blue coat
And a world you made up
Out of someone else's fantasy

Paint stains the clean
Brown black-tipped rosettes
An array of brushes
In all different sizes
In all different shapes
Choose the smallest
To only outline the clouds
The swirling patterns on your page
Four clicks of a lighter
Before a blue flame erupts
The panicked breaths
Forced to slow
When others are home
Because your problems are your own
Yellow and grey cards
Will take you back to hell come morning
A pink coat you find yourself wearing despite everything
And black triangles surrounded with grey
As you question what brought you here,
What made the freezing morning
Finally slip by

Glittered walls
Guitar rising
Have you started running yet?
Keep going
Never slowing down
Sore eyes
You want nothing more than sleep
Than this one power
Because days have been wasted
With this sickness
The sickness that stopped you
From ever slowing down

Glittered keychains
Piano plays
You memorise any lines
It's another chore
Like noting down the times of
All the best events
Keep going
When sleep becomes the enemy
When sleep becomes this void
This void that you wish you could turn to
But it's a bottomless pit you'll never fill
Fall into the darkness
No
Get up
Heavy breathing
You've always prided yourself
On thinking
You'd be able to pick yourself back up
Thinking sure as hell no-one would help
Well maybe that was true once
But it's not anymore
So you don't have to be scared of falling
Anymore,
not anymore
Falling's half the fun
It's the only way to feel alive
It's the only way to keep you down here
When nothing in the world feels real anymore
You've got the world
You've got the voids between them

And you can sleep without being scared
Of not waking up tomorrow

Her Struggle, My Struggle
The problems I left in another world
And the pieces I see her picking up
I can’t help but wonder where we differ.

Her struggle,
Games where you run, learning
To stop hiding,
To be proud and to
Love all of them.

My struggle,
Staying on top, remembering
To keep breathing
To stay strong and to
Stay hidden.

Her struggle, My struggle
The problems she faces in her world
And the pieces I fail to pick up
It’s hard to see where we differ.

Her struggle,
Walking to a school getting worse by the day
Not noticing the world fall apart around her
To stay calm isn’t
An option,
It’s a necessity she doesn’t
Know.

My struggle,
Walking to a school getting harder by the day
Painfully aware of the breaking world around us
To stay calm isn’t
Ideal, but
It’s a painful necessity
I know.

Her struggles, My struggles.
Her life, My life.
Her love, My love.
And I can’t help but wonder where we might differ.

Continue,
Continue when slowing down seems the only option
Nothing is due,
Nothing is due tomorrow
There’s a chance to get something done before doomsday,
Before the clock ticks down to nill
Because once that happens,
Once we can’t see the screen anymore,
There’s nothing to rely on
And this mind
This world
Is destined to burn
We’ve stopped, we’ve lost the melody
We’ve cut the words they couldn’t read
Ten thousand tangents in our heads,
Threaten to spiral off
Into eternity,
Which one is correct?
Which one is correct for now?
Which one can we go down
Later?
This isn’t finished,
I’m scared and I don’t want to create
Another makeshift half-told story
Transitioning between the 200 years
Separating this world from
Something that, by all accounts,
Could be something completely different.

I don’t remember
I don’t remember
No one can remember who she is.
Didn’t this happen before?
White corridors, shopfronts, pink and yellow...
Didn’t this happen before?
I don’t remember
Turning around and, what happened?
She fell, everyone was screaming, and
Someone joked about it the next day

Wait, didn’t this happen months ago?
Why can I remember this conversation?

Why can’t I remember this conversation?

I don’t feel right.

She grabbed a chair. That’s new.
The person talking about it,
He’s wearing a hat.
That, that I remember
Why do I remember this?
Why don’t I remember this?
You’d think I’d remember this

Laughing,
I remember laughing,
Someone laughing,
I remember where I was,
But I wasn’t even there this time
i remember this room,
Or some room that looks the same,
I wasn’t sitting here,
I was standing over there
I don’t remember,
I don’t remember,
The memory is leaving me before I can focus
I saw a face,
I heard laughter,
That poor woman,
I don’t want to remember.

Were you scared,
Were you thinking clearly,
When you clearly believed that I was not,
Did anyone but you think to look twice,
At this eroded shell I lock in a vice,
Because I was half-dead when you asked me last
Whether I'd crossed a line to a black world,
Silver steel sharp threshold and ****** blue keys
And you're the only one who checks that I'm not planning to go
So I've convinced myself you're the only one who'd notice

Even though I know
I know that's not entirely true
But noticing is different to giving a ****

No, I take it back, I can't do this today,
I thought I could maybe get stronger but
I can't,
Get me out,
Get me out,
Please let me out,
Let me out of this, this, this
Nightmare, daydream, mind, body,
These clothes, this building,
This fear of death, this struggle of living...

I'm watching her play games on her phone and I'm smiling.

Rusty steel mesh barricade covered in faded yellow paint,
Great metallic rumbling & click-click-click-click of the train behind us,
Then
The world is still -
      A near-silent buzz fills the air,
Over the railing, the trickle of a dying river runs down the step,
The violet bushes overgrow the banks,
Great trees, thin & leaning
Reach from the waters &
Drip with the dead pears, black sleeping bodies of bats -

As the sun dips to sleep in the furry trees beyond,
Wings rustle,
Orange furry scarves appear &
Chattery cries echo off the water,
Loud & steady beats of leathery black wings erupt
Snouts calling, laughing, shadows taking off into the dimming sky.