I whisper "I wish I were beautiful" into a thin-necked bottle and quickly stop it up with a cork.
Carefully, I place this bottle on my bookshelf.
It is one of many.
I collect wishes but they loom instead of glitter;
The whispers,
They sound like the disorder that ate away at me when I was younger and this all feels so similar.
I bottle up these secret wishes and together the whispers collect into the screaming of my thoughts as I catch my reflection in the window in passing.
In private, I try to press myself together, to make myself more compact, as if somehow I could force all this fat into a more pleasing shape.
In private, I look at the picture I took when my stomach was near flat and my wrists were more dainty and though I know I would be in the hospital the month after that photo was taken I can't help but wish I looked like that again.
I whisper "Make me sick" into a thin-necked bottle and let it weigh down the air around me.
When did I start to believe dead would be better than this?