The girl with a dragon in her chest is always learning.
When she opens her mouth, snarls echo
Up her throat and rattle her teeth,
So she learns not to speak.

When she opens her heart the dragon burns the passerby, and you can only treat so much blistering flesh before your run out of gauze, so,
she learns not to share.

When she opens her mind the dragon laughs.
And she’s learned enough by now to know
how to fix it,
So she learns not to dream.

The girl with the dragon in her chest knows not her own strength,
Or maybe she does,
But she doesn’t want to remember it anymore.

I mean, breaking brittle bones is not pleasant for anyone, especially those who are constantly in casts, so,
She wraps her own wrists and waits, and
learns not to be strong.

Her breath comes in puffs of smoke, filling
The already dingy room with
A layer of dusky darkness,
So, she learns not to breathe.

The girl with the dragon in her chest has
no room for her lungs but
That’s fine, because she has a rib-cage
to hold the dragon and another cage to hold the flood.

The girl with the dragon in her chest is
boiling from the inside out, but,
She still takes hot showers and doesn’t
drink water because it’s hard to slay a dragon
When you’d have to cut yourself open to do it.