She said it was her only life line
scars telling of her life in parts
every detail of every knife line
where one ends, another starts

numbness is nothing
pain is something

she said it was like her only need
satisfaction in killing the numb
in the darkness, she can only bleed
looking forward to the pain to come

Addiction
Has many faces:
Drugs
Alcohol
***
Food

All of these things
Are so hard to lose
But the one that I
Can't seem to set aside,
It is written on my skin
No place for it to hide
Any time I use it, I abuse it
Anything I can get my Hands on
Is good enough for me
A knife
A needle
A safety pin
A box cutter
Something
Anything
To break open my skin
So when it heals, upon my arms
Is an inescapable sin
Will I ever be whole again?
The pain I feel is so addicting,
I won't pretend

It's not that I am sad
I just want to bleed
I am not depressed
For, I don't feel anything
I just want to hurt
Or learn what connective tissue
Looks like when it's stained red
I don't want anybody
To try to fix me
I'm already dead

What have I done?
what's happening to me?
Am I diseased with
the sickness that's infiltrating
the whole nation

A nation of pill popping zombies
that has addicted itself
to the loophole
of "a pill for happiness"
"a pill for desensitization"
"a pill for nerves"
"a pill for life"?

Why have we become a generation of junkies
whose drug is legal
inflicted on us
but degree holding powers
because "they know better"?

Is it normal for humans like me and you
who feel
who see
who taste
who hear
who smell
to be controlled by a singular button
to be confined to a manifesto
of the "latest trend"

Are we all hypnotized
into morphing into the
"perfect body"
"10 ways to get smarter"
"look like this, don't eat"
is it a blueprint set by a superpower
to transform us to identical robots
to make it easier to control us?

Are we slowly walking down the path
of being identical?
Are we losing the only essence of what makes us human?
Are removing our imperfections
and surgically implanting
"my lips should be like this"
"my thigh gap is a must"
"my brain should have a set of guidelines"

What has become of us?
I pity the fish that
flow with the current
I cry over the youth today
I mourn the artists
of yesteryears
I grieve with the widowers
of lost souls

There's still hope
or so I try to believe
and encourage
the dying breed
of
perfectionists
the humble ones
those whose kisses only
land on lips
and not
*****

My nights may physically be dark as well as mentally.
But in the day,
when everything is supposed to be a gift with many colors and feelings
it just feels dull.
like it's still night .
I can't see any beauty or love.
I can only see hatred,
the feelings of anger towards everyone.
I hope that I become lost.
so I can no longer feel anything.
I want to be lost in a haze of colorful smoke. forever.

I remember when
Cutters
Only left tracks
In the snow.

How many cuts could I count?
How many could I place in time and context?
I had to admit that I couldn't remember the occasion of almost any of them, their catalysts, whether epic or mundane, completely obscured by time.
So many moments of supposedly unendurable pain, now utterly forgotten.
You start to think, maybe I don't need this anymore.
Maybe I never did.
I was trying to get equilibrium from two extremes: either I was so upset that I had to cut myself to relieve it, or I was so numb that I had to cut myself to get back to being there.