If I asked, would you let me die?

I don't really want to die, I don't think
I like chocolate too much
To never taste it on my lips again, to never again watch someone smile,
Never again to feel my vocal cords rub against each other as I sing-
I don't know if I could really do away with those things.
I almost can't stand the thought of you and sis crying alone together in black, after all the time I've spent holding you two up when dad died,
But then I remember.
If I'm dead, it isn't going to matter to me. I won't have to care about you.
I won't feel a thing.
Only the living have to regret the dead.
People always tell me that life is worth it, but is it really? A bubble in the middle of nowhere where people shoot each other and kiss each other, and despite how grand it feels, it never means anything.
I'm pointlessly running step after step on a timeline to nothing. My legs are burning, my lungs are crying, so why shouldn't I just stop?
And god, it is tempting.
You know the moment when someone's grandma's irreplaceable glass vase first hits the ground?
It leaves you wincing, almost as if every crack that splinters its surface is being carved across your skin,
as if every tinkling shard can make your teeth chatter?
That is what I feel inside, every day. There is no word for it other than broken. My soul is shattered.
Never feel that again, never have to chase all those thoughts.
All those thoughts, I wish I could forget them.
Apparently, I hate myself? And I'm cruel to myself? I'd always just thought that this is what it was to be human.
To control every aspect of yourself- how you speak, how you sneeze, how you smile-
To have an average grade make you feel like a failure, because you could have put more in, and you're a worthless procrastinator, how dare you take a few minutes to write a poem when you have the tasks of others to attend to?
I believe with every bit of myself that other people matter more than me, but you can't live like that.
It's not that I want to hurt you, mom, sis, it's that I'm finally going to do something for myself instead.
I've enjoyed it while it lasted, but I think I'm done. I need to tap out, cancel my subscription. There's nothing left I want from life that death doesn't promise louder.

And then I remember chocolate and change my mind.

I am not going to **** myself
I am not going to **** myself
There is no pain
I'm okay
I am not going to **** myself
*Please don't let me **** myself

Didn't really expect another one so soon? Neither did I. But it turns out that once you start walking in the gardens of death, the scent of the flowers there is overpowering. Poppy fields, blood red, sweet sleep- addicting. Your nose keeps leading you in circles even when your head warns you to watch your step.
I wish I could say this was for real. But the problem is, we all know me by now. I'm never actually going to, and that makes it hard for people to care.
"There she goes, the one always bothering us about her nonsense. Why won't she give this up already?"
I'm still trudging through my life sentence, chains on my ankles, family and friends on my wrists. It's hard for them to understand. To them, it's all "**** yourself already" or "join the rest of society." It's a waste of everyone's time otherwise.
I've become the girl who cries wolf, and everyone including me knows she's always sounding a false alarm. But god, I can't help but cry sometimes, can I? It hurts, it hurts. I bite my lips to keep from falling down the stairs.
The scent of poppies clouds around my head.
I can't help but wonder if everything I do is somehow goodbye. If maybe I'll get run over by a car on the 40 minute walk home. Or maybe I'll finally lose myself so far in this cloud of flowers that I test out the surest way to die. Just in case, I'm trying to build a pile of memories of me. Just in case one day someone needs to fill up a girl-sized space in the world. Just in case.
It's just that, no matter how grand this world seems, there's only so much to do here. There's only a few categories of gifts you can buy for people, a few types of jobs you can do. The days play on repeat, always purposeless, always fatal. And I'm trying to color them all with sunbeams and starshine, but I'm weary. One day, I don't think the lights will be warm enough. One day, I think I'm going to give up.
But not today. Today, I force my eyes open, and I watch my step. I will not stumble into a final rest among these sweet, soft flowers, lovely as it sounds.
I will not give up today.