When you tell your daughter that your life has been a series of near car crashes
Forgive her for mistaking the gloss behind your eyes - as nostalgia for a wreck that could have been
Forgive her for clawing her skin with the intent of stirring a tornado so violent she could match your presence
You taught her to see you as a fatality; too late to be saved, too proud to be held

Remember that an animal licking it's wound does so out of self-preservation, not self-pity
Remember that saline is salt water and tears need to be shed and that humans are capable of healing

Remember to feel
Teach her to pummel her fists
Teach her to shout down the boys

Remember the hollow below your heart that echoes like an abandoned house
When ivy grows out from her chest cavity and encapsulates all around you
Remember that she is not unruly
She merely sees within you a potency to create beauty

And consider her ability to grow and grow and grow
Encourage her to expand
Be mindful that little girls should never need permission to occupy space
Be humble - she may even teach you a thing or two

I'm tipping myself over to encourage response from deep in your throat
the wind breaks over in ignorance of my spastic limbs
illicit - I want to stop and tell you how I used to pull out my own teeth
and now I would do anything to squeeze myself in the gaps between yours
tell me you love me
feel me
need
me

I wake in the dim light of morning mumbling my own name

I washed my hair for the first time in three weeks and
learned to stop walking on tiptoes
                I am the bitter taste at the back of your throat.
Some nights, I turn on every light in the house and sit awake picking skin
from my chapped lips
               I am full-circle and puncture wounds.
I wanted to be the girl to wear her heart on her sleeve but
my armband was embroidered with a *******

I was misinformed. Romanticised.
There isn't romance in 4am shudders, in skin stuck to the teal sofa or the sweat between my
shoulder blades. In yellow stained fingers nicotine or black stained lungs tar.
For protection, I tried pouring a ring of salt - and found myself
sitting cross-legged on the floor
rubbing salt into my wounds
           No ritual can protect me from myself.