No words
I don’t write letters
not to myself, not to anyone.
The first time I wrote a letter
it was to my best friend in the hospital.

What does that say about me?

To my younger self,
who wouldn’t listen,
who won’t listen,
I don’t write this to you.

I won’t tell you about
what occured in October 2016
or the job in the summer of 2018.

What of that week in 2015 that you will begin
to learn how to hate?

No, not others. Yourself.

Dates don’t mean anything
but they linger around your head,
worming their way through cracks
in a well worn veneer.

I can’t explain the haunted memories that have silk bows
wrapped around the pinnacle of my fingers.

How do I explain the loss and grief
of losing myself without contouring the edges
into selfishness?

There aren’t words that strike
the anvil with enough malice to endow
the emotion with truth. A simple veritable power
taken away from my reaching grasp and I fathom the silence with
crushing, lovely anger you relish.

A letter to you? They asked me to write about the struggle
I would carve out for you? I wouldn’t wish that upon any child,
not even you.

You don’t need to understand the vibrance of hunger,
peeling scraps of skin to the floor.

So I say to you, don’t go looking for answers,
You may crave the sturdy oak floors, but
it’s better to fly than fall before you’re time.

I don’t write letters, I write
about people and aches that never pass
and stories of deranged hope but I
cannot write a letter to you.

You are not yet ready to write honestly,
the lies seep through and bury themselves in
layers of truths.
You’d say, that’s cliche
But how do you explain three long years?

I was told you write a letter to you…
I refuse.