"This won't hurt."

"Maybe later, darling"
"Yes, we're nearly there."

"Nothing's going to change, it's just Daddy will live at his new house, and Mummy will stay living here."

"Things will be so much better when you get to secondary school."

"You'll definitely use what we learn in this lesson in future life."
"No, it's Daddy that doesn't want you to get your ears pierced, I'm fine with it."
"We'll be best friends forever, won't we?"
"No, I liked him before you liked him."

"I hate you."

"I love you"

"These exams are the most important things you've done so far."
"That haircut looks so good on you!"
"Of course I know how to pierce ears, who doesn't?!"

"These exams are the most important things you've done so far."
"Things will be so much better when you get to university."

"Nah, no-one's actually allergic to MDMA, I reckon it's a government conspiracy."
"Seven inches, swear down."
"Oh, that assignment? It's at home."

"No, honestly darling, I love your tattoo!"

"I love you."
"I won't be late."

"Now you're in the real world!"

Any sentence that starts with the words "When I was your age..."

"It's not that I don't like him..."
"Oh come on! It'll be fun."

"You're too young to be this sad."

"This won't hurt."

Can you hear the people sing?
Not with vocal chords, or silver tongues,
the songs of silent change.

The broken promises
(that crack ribs and pelvic bones)
provide percussion.

The strings;
your fingers tangles in my hair,
I feel the sliding scales.

Don't stop playing.

There's a rhythm in your dying cells
(regenerate per seven years,
someday there'll be a you I haven't touched yet).

There is metal in my flesh,
my song is sung titanium
and ink,
and I hope I am imagining
that we sing at the same pitch.


Don't change.

Would you still love me if I wasn’t classed as
“more to love”?

If I wouldn’t count as
“plus-size”,

If I didn’t have to shift through racks of clothes looking for the ones labelled
“L”?

If there was no
softness
to me,
if the curves of my hips were interrupted by
bones
jutting out,
if I was angular enough for you to
cut yourself
on, if I was
thin
enough to be
pretty?

Would you still love me if you knew that
every chip you fed to me,
every chocolate you bought for me,
everything you ever saw me eat was being
written down
and
calculated?

Would you still love me if every time you heard the shower running, you’d know that I’d weighed myself just before getting in
every
single
time?

Would you still love me if you walked in on me
clawing
at the back of my own throat in a
desperate
attempt to bring up
everything
but the conversation about how I wasn’t eating right?

If my skin got worse,

If you could taste how hungry I was every time
you kissed me,

If the only way to hold me was catching me
off-guard,

If when you pulled me on top of you, I
immediately
stood up because I knew I was
too heavy
for your
fragile hands and
perfect ribs?

Would you still love me if you’d have been the one to hear
“She can’t have an
eating disorder,
people with
eating disorders
aren’t fat”?

If at
every meal
you’d become acutely aware that my father’s side of the family was watching me eat,
just to see if I was,

If I went from hearing
“Wow, you look great, you’ve lost so much weight now”
to
“Oh my God, are you sick?”,

If I was still fourteen and thought that the
numbers on that scale
were directly correlated with how
happy
I could be?

Would you still love me if you knew me at fifteen?

Jesus ******* wept.

I cannot stand you standing there.
Come here and let me hate you with my mouth.

I cannot give you gentle, and I cannot give you soft pink flesh and flushed cheeks.

I want your tongue more productive than just telling me you love me.
I want hands between my thighs, not just grasping, interlocking fingers.

I see your toes curl and fists clench as I disappear beneath the sheets
And breathe wanting you in the language we both recognise.
I can’t stand you, I just want you.

I want you silent or screaming,
But **** me, I don’t want you talking.

Give me a *******
With a heart

And a **** hard as stone.

The last time I has *** was in London.
Here is a list of thing I’d rather have been doing;

>Going to The Diner in Soho and eating a hotdog with bacon and sour cream (yes, that euphemism was entirely intentional)

>Touching all the pretty things in the massive, three-storey Paperchase

>Losing myself in the British Museum (hey, did you know that tentacle **** is older than electricity?)

>Lying in my back in Hyde Park and letting the rain fall on my face

>Avoiding living statues (they scare the **** out of me)

>Eating at that café on Barking Road

>Chasing pigeons in Trafalgar Square and resisting the urge to sit on one of the lions

>Dancing in front of a busker in Waterloo tube station

>Attending a Nick Cave gig and crying because he’s such a beautiful man

>Sitting in an art gallery and giggling at the tiny *******

>Wandering around Anne Summers, looking at things I can‘t afford but are very shiny none-the-less

>Giving tourists the right directions, because I’m not a complete ****

Anything but you