Everyone who says words don’t hurt

should spend a night trying to sleep despite the itching rash on the back of their neck

that formed because they hated themselves so much their body had an allergic reaction

like their skin was a suit that didn’t fit right over the bumps and scars and welts and bruises of hundreds of terrible words

singed and beaten and cut into their skin out of the mouth of someone who was supposed to love them unconditionally

don't ever let them tell you monsters aren’t real

monsters are real but they aren’t dragons or demons

they walk around in the skin of your father and spew fiery hatred from their cavernous mouths without ever laying on hand you because oh no

that would be too easy

a bruise will fade in time but the scars on your mind from every awful word he ever pointed at you tears at you worse than a bullet from a gun

it’s shrapnel of the soul, ripping you apart from the inside every time you move or think or breathe or speak

sometimes i wish that he’d hit when i was 13 instead of calling me stupid and fat and ugly

because one fist to face and he’d be out on his *** where he belonged

instead he just made it so poetry is a from of physical therapy

where you cut yourself open and bleed words from your soul

like a desperate snake bike victim draining poison and blood from their veins

and at night you lie in bed and listen to the quiet beating of your fragile swollen heart

still here, still here, still here, still here, still here

you dont know if it's a reminder or a threat anymore

living is too hard but you're too weak to die so you suffer through every day

slowly and without confidence that you can make it through another

and like a person sent to war you think it's over when you get to leave the trenches

but you're wrong

the battle wages on in your head for years

none of your wounds have a chance to scar and heal as they get ripped open over and over again

you spend your life running confused and scared in a haze of blood loss

until finally your legs give out and you can't run anymore

and when someone tries to offer you a hand and pick you up

you're gun shy

it's okay, it's not your fault really

to others the world has been an oyster but to you it's felt like an iron maiden

but your comrade persists and pulls you gently to your feet

and tries to wrap your soul in bandages of pretty words

and bits of wisdom you need but don't want to hear

you try not to let them unravel, you know it would hurt him, he was so careful in not grazing the raw parts of you when he put them on

but sometimes it just happens

so he holds your hand and wraps you up again and lays beside you at night

listening to the quiet beat of your fragile, swollen heart

please stay, please stay, please stay, please stay, please stay

if you looked at my shoulders and my wrists
and how broadly they are set
how far from delicate and fragile
or if you looked and the thickness of my waist
and the heft of my weight
i doubt you would expect me to be this breakable
i certainly didnt
the truth is i dont really know if i am
im too afraid to let anyone close enough to try
the last person who molded me in their hands like clay left gouges where my organs should be
and a dozen half moon scars on my arms
and i am afraid to let anyone touch me again
even if they claim its to smooth out my cracks and gashes
im trying to seal them up myself
but i cant reach them all
my arms are only so long and when i try to reach the deep ones
the shallow ones crack open again
i dont know if i was poured into the wrong mold
or just made of the wrong clay
maybe i just got broken and glued back together wrong
i wonder if any of my pieces went missing

I am not a diamond
I am not glistening, not desired by many.
But I do think I might be coal
Seen as useful by some
*****, disgusting, polluting by others
And if you put me underground
The weight of the earth pressing in on me from all sides
Just maybe I could be something pretty, wanted.

Maybe I'm like black coffee
An acquired taste, not enjoyed by many
One even myself cannot stomach.
(What does that say about me?)
And I desperately fill myself with words and pictures
Soft and beautiful like gossamer and lace
All of the things I am not
In hopes that I will be sweet enough to drink.

Perhaps I'm a portrait, all broken brush strokes
And darkened shades of pthalos
And the voice drifting past say how beautiful it is
And how they can't wait to see it when it's done.
But it's already finished
They simply don't like to believe something that dark and eerie and broken
Is not a work in progress.

I guess this is just my fate
to be surrounded by people waiting for me to become something more than I am
Something less dark and broken
Something more delicate and beautiful
Something sweeter.
But they'll all leave in time
When they realize this is actually who I am
And that I'm not unfinished.

Remembering you were once just beside me
Is like the cut on the roof of my mouth
From eating too many tootie pops
It stings
But it is also a reminder that once
There was sweetness

it's never going to be easy to be four hundred miles from the first home you ever knew
and it's going to get harder when your mother gets diagnosed with cancer
and her best friend is dead and can't take care of her
and you can't take care of her because you're four hundred miles away
and you shouldn't have to take care of her because you're a scared 19 year old kid
but you will anyway because that's just how you operate
take care of everyone else forget to eat don't cry don't you dare ******* cry realize you haven't eaten since breakfast and it's almost midnight drink too much coffee lose sleep
but if everyone else is okay you'll be fine

and it's never going to be easy to be who knows how far away from the love of your life
the person you want to hold in your arms at night so maybe
just maybe
you can cry just a little and let go just a little and stop pretending you're okay and just hurt for awhile because for the love of god you're only 19 this isn't fair  and everything ******* hurts and you're mommy is sick and the closest thing you had to a second mom is dead because she drank herself to death and you can grin and bear it but you're not okay and nothing else is either

so you sit on campus and pour out words so you don't pour out tears
and your fingers are chapped and cold from the breeze off the ocean
and the breeze used to feel like home but now it's just cold and you wish you were warm at home, home home your real home, with your mother and your cat and the things you've seen every day since you could see
your eyes and nose are red and you don't know if it's from crying or the cold and you type so hard you forget to breathe
and all you want is to go home

but instead you close your eyes and scrunch away the tears fighting their way out
and you shove your hands inside your absurdly oversized sweater inbetween bites of the vending machine chimichanga you inevitably burn your mouth on
and you **** it up and tell everyone you're fine and go to class and get good grades
because if everyone else is fine
you can be okay for a few more hours
a few more days
a few more weeks
however long it takes

(but just because you do it doesn't mean it's easy)

I wish I could sing for you
But my voice is as rough as the canvas I paint on
And my medium has never been vocals
I have neither the talent or lung capacity
I am not rhythmic, simply loud.

I would write for you
But I fear I have already sent too many words your way
And you will begin to believe
(However truthfully)
That words are all I have to give.

I would paint or draw for you
But the lines produced by my clumsy, ringed fingers
Would never measure up to the delicate lines
Your hands trace into my skin.

I would simply show you I love you
By holding your hand
And brushing your hair from your eyes as you snooze
But you are too far
And my cold arms could never reach you.

I will offer you all this regardless.
My voice though it is rough and shaking.
My words though they are overused and ocassionally pretentious.
My artwork though it will never be as beautiful as your hands on my skin.
Myself, though I am cold and far away, graceless and indelicate, lost for words, and rough and broken.

I offer myself to you, broken pieces I may be, and I am yours to take or toss aside.
(Though I hope that you will choose the former)

I want to be fluent in you like a language
I want to roll you across my tongue like a Spanish R
Feel you catch in my throat like a French E
I want to memorize you like an Italian sonnet
And recite you like Shakespeare