We're above the influence
Alcohol is for Them
But here We are
Drunk as happy hour regulars

I tell my professor that I'm struggling with depression
He tells me he didn't notice.
Like it is something I am supposed to wear on my arm
If I am not covered in cuts or darkness
It's not happening.
I've learned
When someone feels like they don't have choices
They resort to the best way of surviving
That they know how to.
For me, that's faking it
Plastic face, ripped in half
I am tearing myself to shreds
Behind clear eyes.
What you don't see is the scars on my chest
That I get from scraping my skin with nails
Any perceived blemish must come off
I hide the holes with makeup and clothing
Dressed to impress.
What you don't see is the nearly infected patch of skin
Under my hairline
Because I can't stop reopening the wound
I keep it concealed.
My body is not a canvas on which I paint
My compulsive habits and depressive symptoms
For all to see.
I survive the best I can
And it almost comes off as if I'm thriving
Sometimes I forget there are days
When moving my limbs ***** the life out of me
I fool myself into thinking I'm fine
Until I get hit with a tidal wave of triggers
They always seem to appear in threes
I keep trying to arrange the broken pieces
So I look pretty
Isn't that the best thing that a woman can be anyway?
Or so we're taught.
I tell my professor
"I'm trying."
He thanks me for explaining things to him.
Submitting to my own guilt
For speaking of pain,
My mouth forms a small smile
After all, this is the way
I have been taught
To survive.

You lie to push away worthy blame
But what will you do...
when the lies are turned back at you?

I know you're contemplating suicide.
I know you're wishing your pain would end.
But you are not your pain...
So don't let it become you.

Cat calls choke my confidence
My responses aren't so strong  
Skirts always feel too short
Shirts always too long

Some say I was asking for it
Others say it was my clothes
I say it was a misfit
Letting lust fall like dominoes

So here I am stuck screaming
Black and bruised and used
I wasn't asked to be born pretty
If I had been, I would've refused

We dance around each other
Call it The Tango of Fear

I'm tired of silently suffering and struggling

I often find myself wishing the best for everyone *except myself

If I'm being honest
I'm tired of being a poet.
I'm tired of findig meaning in everything from the lines of the sky to the cracks in the side walk
I'm tired of using extended metaphors to explain how overwhelmed or angry or sad I am 
I'm tired of immortalizing the people I love or hate in half assed lines of poetry
For once I would like a good day just to be a good day or a bad day just to be a bad day
A landscape to hold no higher meaning than to magnify the glory of existence
For the people I know to hold no cosmic significance in the fabric of time
I would like to sit and be quiet
To write and be at peace
For the storm to pass over
And to find some relief
This is not a game for me this is how I breathe and I am tired of having to hold meaning in every crack and every crevice
My poetic nature has become a menice in my tired skin
I'm tired of letting the light in
But this isn't something you quit
This is something you breathe
This is something you are
This is something you need
Even if it doesn't make sense all the time
This is the one true thing I know that's mine
My sense of rhythm and my sense of rhyme
And it isn't easy all the time
Because these days life moves faster than I've even known
Faster than I can process what I've been shown
These days it's easy to feel the weight of all of my time spent alone
My mind isn't home
I'm chilled to the bone
These days I'm tired of being tired and tired of writing about how tired I am
Like I'm six feet under but I'm not yet dead
Using poetic devices to say what's already been said
I'm tired of playing this game
Imortalizing name after name
I still feel the same
Even though I still keep writing
So what I'm trying to say is that I need poetry like I need water but sometimes if you drink too fast or you drink too deep you feel like you're drowning
Out to sea in familiar surroundings
It's astounding how tiring being a poet can be.