I stopped believing in love when you told me one of the highlights of my broken and fragile life was “a mistake”

For the longest time I
aspired to be that picture perfect image
Of the girls with hip bones and thigh gaps
From the covers of the magazines
I read when I was a kid

Because I was told that is “normal”
That is what girls are supposed to look like

But now i've come to the realisation that
I've spent so much time trying to look
like what was told to me as normal
That ive become oblivious
to my goal of standing out

Why should I spend so much time trying to conform
When I could create myself in to the person I truly want to be

We laughed
We touched
We kissed

I loved
You left  

I hurt
You thrived


We broke apart…

I broke apart
under the pressure of my own expectations

He says “her” like it means “amen” I say “us” pretending I could be them

People say I will go to hell
For touching him and loving her
But If hell is filled with what society deems sinners
Baby call me the devil

He had no flesh left
his bones protrude through the skin he hid behind
As he approached my window at 1:02
I wonder what to do
What to say
How to make him feel content
even when everyone is telling him he's not good enough

What is good enough?

What makes you beautiful is not how thin or thick you are
Its not how many lips you have kissed
Or guys you have touched
What makes you beautiful is you

Love your curves and your rolls
Your small lips and prominent hips
Every scratch, scar and stretch mark
Is what makes you,

You.

The more I watch it the more I think about what It was like to be with you
And the more I realise that what you said to me was true

WE were never really together
I was... Not you

We were both in love
We both still are
Except one of us has always loved another person
And that one of us is you.

To the little girl in the princess sheets
You hear tales of the bad guys
Always being  monsters with long nails and sharp teeth
hidden in your dark closet or at the end of your bed
Lurking around in the shadows waiting to grab you

They're never kings with endless gold
Or knights with shining armour
Never blonde haired and blue eyed with a contagious smile

So when the smiling man with the blonde hair and blue eyes
Asked you to step into his palace
Not once did you think to question the intentions
Of his soft and familiar fingertips.

So when you found yourself locked beneath his claws
Telling you, you want it
You will  try to convince yourself that you asked him to
That the sliver of skin must have been an invitation

Don't believe that
Because you are a ******* princess
And all the other boys and girls with cut out tongues
Will help you tell your story...

They will help Tell the guards and the monsters that
No matter how many times they ask you to be quiet
You will scream and shout until every prince and princess
Feels safe against intruders who come inside their homes

It is time to come out from under your princess sheets
Because you are stronger than  you could ever imagine  
YOUR WORDS can rescue trauma embedded in the minds of others
YOUR WORDS can crumble kingdoms
YOUR WORDS can save others.

You are a human embodiment of the word smile

I was a porcelain puppet
You pulled my strings

So I had no choice but to
Obeyed your abusive commands

You controlled me

I had  become accustomed
to your twisted instructions

For so long That I was too afraid
To detach myself from
the strings you wrapped around me

You told me
I would be nothing without you

And for a while I was nothing without you
Because you broke me so badly
That no one else wanted me

Until the kind Girl with the
rosie cheeks and the golden heart
Taught me what love really is

It isn’t the control and strings
Its seeing that I am more than just a object
for others to take advantage of

I am kind, smart and beautiful
And I can survive without a puppeteer
I can thrive on my own.

Mosh pit at concerts
On the bus alone at night
Blasting music home alone
Hugging and holding hands with someone you love
                          

Super markets at night    
Long rehearsals with friends
Playgrounds before the sun comes up
Kissing the person you like for the first time
                          

High school parties
Hospital waiting rooms
Walking alone along an empty beach
In the car when there's heavy rain,

You call it “**** culture” I call it last night

You said your type was skinny blondes
I now have blonde hair and an eating disorder

You knows what really sad
The fact that you talk about her so much
That I get sad and angry everytime I see her
Because I see everything that you see in her
And I see none of that in me

We were 12 when we would walk down the street and have men look us up and down, staring at us  hungrily. Men smiling and whistling at us  like we are  some sort of pet that they were trying to catch.

we were 13 when  we had to watch what we wore because if too much shoulder was showing or if our shorts were too short we would distract the boys at school from their “learning” because clearly boys learning is more important than ours seeing the only thing we were learning were tips and tricks about what we should and shouldn't be wearing... because if our skirts were too short or our stomach was  too exposed that would show the guys that we “wanted it.”

But clearly those tips and tricks didn't help because at the age of 14 we were grabbed by boys at the mall and in the streets, but it was okay because “it meant we were hot and had **** bodies.” but There is nothing **** about getting used to saying “there was this man who…”

We were 15 when we yelled and sobbed because the men that use to stare at us on the streets found their way into our sheets... as we cried "no, Please don't touch us there ” but I guess my no sounded like a yes and my don't touch me sounded like a carry on and that my terrified eyes and paralyzed body looked like I want to be touched.
Even after everything that happened People tried to teach us that there was nothing that I could do about it and that we should just count ourselves lucky and get use to it…. But how is it possible to get use to being a human object that men can touch whistle and purr at as they please.

We went from having  little boys call us names and pulling on our braids to having a trail of tears fall down our faces each night .Because we knew once we closed our puffy and abused eyes, we would see the men, the men who found their way in our dreams... I guess We went from playing with toys  to eventually becoming toys ourselves.

I wonder if there's love after life

If nights of music and manic love
Lives on after we die


Or if it all just stops
If our love discontinues
If our beautiful bodys
And empowered existences
Get swept away into oblivion

Last night You asked me why I am so afraid to lose you

I'm afraid to lose you because
You are the reason why
I am afraid to die

I wish someone told me,

Love is not putting your  pleasure before my  protection
Love is not believing my body is your toy
Love is not being forced into anything I don't want to do

Because I lifted my shirt in an attempt to heal your broken mind
I silenced myself, my voice, my protests for your apology

Yet You held the gun to your  head
Made me believe I was the one
who made you feel as though you were better off dead

I'm still scared to look at my phone at night
Because of the chance the ringing is another suicide call

“Why did you break up with me,
You said you loved me,
If you hang up ill **** myself”

You were a disease
plagued by your own mind and  fixation
Tell my why did I have to be your victim!?

Its 4 a.m i'm Self medicating through text messages
That we are sending each other
Unable to process the fact that
“I love you” , “I miss you”
is often used by men who are just bore

You told me we  "accept the love we think we deserve",
and I think of you and all the ways you broke my body, my curves

I was your coloring book , your fists  were the pencils colouring me in,
blue, purple, red, completely branding my skin.


I'd apologise for making you mad,
convincing myself that I was the one who was bad...

but really you were the shooter hunting  me down,
The one holding my head underwater hoping I'd drown.

You told me we "accept the love we think we deserve"
As I sat there reflecting on our "love" with reserve,

What we had wasn't love, it was manipulation
Caused by your irrational fixation

Time was what worries us
Until it got to 3am
Then time became a social construct