Food. What is food?
Is it something everyone needs to survive? Is it the thing that takes forever to make and has even less time time to enjoy?
Is it the beautiful plants that grow in the right season that produces so much pride that they deserve an instagram post?
Or is the thing that many people will never have the money to see?
For me, it is the center of everyday. It is the one thing that I know dictates my entire life. It is the one thing I wish I could forget and the one thing I wish I could live without.
It is the thing that forces me to do math, and it is the thing that keeps me from knowing any sort of satisfaction.
It is the thing that makes me wish I were someone else, anyone else.
It is the thing that I spend hours thinking about, measuring, classifying, and the one thing that I can never seem to get correct. It is also the thing that makes me cry at night. It makes me feel alone.
It is the thing that causes me to spend every day working out even when I don't want to, and it has made me be friends with a scale that isn't very friendly.
It is a bully, a cruel "ex" friend that wishes I were never born and it is a fighter that knows how to pack a heavy punch.
For me, it has not been very kind. It has been the thing that controls who I am.
It is THE thing, and sadly, it is everything.

I took myself from from city to city
To pursue my dreams as tall as skyscrapers
But with more freedom comes more precaution
And all the safety nets set around couldn’t catch me from the fall

Mom told me to not forget about the top lock of my door at night
Dad said to always tell a friend when I’m heading out
I’ve learned not to ride the subway alone after 5 pm
But I needed someone to tell me that I did the right thing

I navigated my nights through pavements and grids
I found myself in the Upper East side, the streets shifting beneath my feet
Bacardi dictating each of my steps, but making no difference when I danced
I was always told to never trust a back alley, but no one warned me about a dance floor

I stumble my way onto the street, change scattered all over 72nd
I count the pennies like I count sheep, usually I’m out by 30
Hailing a cab, with him right beside me
My head rests on his shoulder along with the thought of good intentions

His apartment had a remarkable view of the skyline, but I can’t look at it the same
The Empire State reminds me of bruises on my thighs and muffled screams
My night faded in and out from flickering kitchen lights and cold linoleum flooring
But the next morning clarity hit
Veiled with excuses
Confusion
Regret
Shame
They say the NYPD are the finest in the world
But I sit in this cold, stale building reflecting on the night before
My mascara still smeared and a rip in my tights

“Is this what you were wearing?”
“How much exactly did you have to drink”
“You agreed to go to his apartment though”
“How often do you go home with strangers?”

My throat is tight
Everything I say is taken and twisted
Eyes glaring at me with low-brows
And the smell of burnt coffee
Trust draining out my body as color drains from my face
I’m ripping through the safety nets, one by one

Unable to take their judgemental gaze, I look up at the ceiling
Answering questions
I think to myself, “Was this moment in a cold police station even worth the fight?”
Was this cry for help from one terrible night worth the trauma they’ve caused from doubt
It’s unbelievable that I would have to rationalize which event was worse

I just needed someone to tell me I did the right thing.

I can’t look at them
I still look up and answer questions
That time spent counting each tile on the ceiling until it was over,
when i should have been counting sheep,
hoping I can wake up and this was just a dream,
but I keep counting…

100, 200, 300..

Don't show your scars, or they might multiply.
They spread and spread, and give more pain.
They make friends angry, and make friends sad.
You lose more acquaintances, and gain more enemies.

The times last year
you stole my body
I remember vividly
As that day grows near
I feel hatred growing in me
Something I have not felt
For anyone but myself
In the longest time
I wish I could show you
What your theft left me with
Or go back in time and
Lock the door though
you climbed through the window

Did you think I would have let you in?

Your confidence smelled
Of Cologne mixed with power
Your alpha hands grabbed my waist
And I have thrown up every day
Remembering how you called me names
For telling you to stay the **** away

I still see it sometimes and I hate that
No one, not even the witness believed me
I have yet to fill what you dug when you stole my body from me

Sometimes I wish you would have hit me
because I could take a blow like that
and get back up in a minute
those scars heal like bandaged paper cuts
though they hurt like hell at first, you **** it up
your skin covers its own trenches in amazing resilience

Sometimes I wish you would have hit me
because I could handle a few bruises on my arm
over endless nights of hearing your words that cut like knives
but the wounds do not go away,
they get deeper with time and everything I try to cover them with
too, is covered in blood

Sometimes I wish you would have hit me
because I would not hurt a year after leaving
Sometimes I wish you would have hit me
I fear the easier one to heal from is a physical beating

my internal therapist is telling me to not write this poem
to not dwell on damaged thoughts, there's no fixing them, dear.
so maybe not.
maybe i'm not writing this poem to try to fix my broken thoughts
maybe i just want peace maybe i am hurting and writing this poem is the only way i know how to wade through the swamp of pain you've thrown me in
two years ago this week, i was getting ready to see my sister marry her best friend
i was bright eyed, had a mane of hair i couldn't tame, excited about life
i was joking with some new friends i'd made about one of them crashing the wedding
i was about to meet Anxiety for the first time
now here i am, shorter hair, sitting with my laptop perched upon sweatpant clad, starved, legs, my fingers not moving fast enough over the keys, i'm tired.
Anxiety and I have taken our relationship to the next level and he visits me often, particularly at night when I'm thinking about you
Anxiety gets jealous, punishes me, forces me to think about your words while suffocating me
i'm tired
i'm afraid that lies about me still flood your mind and i can't change that
i want to talk to you, have a conversation, ask you why
i've apologised and still i will say i am sorry because i am
why do you loathe me so much
i've had people tell me to get over myself, over you, over the situation and i'm trying
but i've never had someone do what you did to me and i'm hurting still this pain i wonder, did you intentionally do it to bring me down?
you've must've known what with my history of attention seeking self harming downward spiral
i never did it for attention
i've taken to numbing myself, last night i dug around my art supplies box for the set of extra blades my sister in law gave me for my pencil sharpener for christmas
i'm not sharpening anything, there isn't anything to sharpen
my friend tells me not to do it, that it doesn't do me any good long term
because that's what i'm dealing with right? long term pain?
sleepless nights and anxiety attacks
sadness i can't escape from
saying no when my niece asks me to play sorry willow i'm tired i'm so tired
so maybe my blades won't bring me long term salvation
maybe two years in therapy won't help but that's okay i was in there anyway for the big mess of my life that you told me to get over
maybe i don't care and am going to treat my thighs as cutting boards because temporary sanity is sanity and i've lost my head as it is
my therapist on wednesday will tell me to forget you
and i will try
and i will fail
i don't know why i'm writing this poem
i'm a crazy believer in better things
how this poem will make things better is beyond me but hey
sue me for trying to see hope in the little things
how artless of me
the artist in me, pain(ting)
-
-z.z