I long for touch but yet I flinch when someone gets too close.
I suppose it's the feeling of fear that overcomes me.
Or the voices that flood my memory of the people saying 'You'll never be pretty enough and your soul is too dark.'
I guess I'll just spend my days basking in the wretched comments and the feeling of never being good enough.
I'm displeased when I look in the mirror, and I start to understand what the people say.
Maybe get some surgery and all of the pain will go away.
But even if I did that the rude remarks would still be there.
And I'd still be heavy with all of the weight on my shoulders.

where am i?
how am I to write when
I am no different from
those gaseous ephemeral words
who lie prostrate upon
the pages of my dictionary
carved plainly into
those battlefields strewn across
the wartorn country
my heart the despotic dictator
whose primal drumming
carries no tune
and no rhythm
and throws of explosions
grenades that
black out the world for
a brief moment
until it careens back and
slams into me
disorientated

i should have been born twice
for how could i have
both my body and that
intangible inexplicable
something inside
it stirs at the molten core
of me
that chasm that forged
those graven images
that first gave way to
a pictographic language
and offered me
a voice
to explain that immutable
all powerful
urge
lust
to throw myself on that
red button and
detonate
burst into a million pieces
and finally relieve that
nauseating pressure
of adipose smushed between
holy bone and
saintly skin
interloping in that space
and separating two lovers

barriers create madness

walls box me in
and yet i grow
an expanding balloon girl
macy’s day parade and
candy littered streets
and razor sharp edges
to steel walls pressing harder
against me than
my supple skin could
ever possibly press
back

i can’t breathe

there is no room
for my lungs to expand
and feel the
fresh sun filled meadow
of crystal air
delivering oxygen to
starved alveoli
and i can’t find your chest
to guide me
in impossible respiration

i’m suffocating in my own skin
from no outside force
but my body itself
turns inward and
shouts its dominance at my
cowering self
sniveling in the corner
of my dusty half used heart
where no blade could possible
land a blow deep enough
to silence the torment and
particular personal poison
a torture to course through
every part of me
activating every single neuron
and making me
hyperaware of my
shame and noxious
venomous corpulence
a reality i
never wanted you to see
but is written plainly
in fiery script across my forehead
and in every fold of fat.

You know why I'm obsessed with makeup?
You know why I literally BREAK. DOWN. when I see myself in the mirror on one of those REALLY ugly days that I have?
You know why I seem f!cking vain and beauty obsessed and attention seeking because of how self-deprecating I am?
You know why I am currently crying...alone...on my bedroom floor...kind of pathetically?

Because now I'm a little bit scared
That maybe I DO have a disease of the mind
Maybe I DO have something in my head that isn't right
It just seems so impossible
Because I mean
I look in the mirror
And all I see is this hideous shameful beastly girl
So ugly
In fact, I genuinely feel terrible for the people who have to look at me
and I don't know why
I just don't see how anybody could ever possibly think that I am pretty
And for some reasons I'm crying right now
And I feel really alone
But no no no
There is no way I really have dysmorphia
Is there?

I feel embarrassed
Like I come across shallow
And stupid
And makeup obsessed
Because I can't ever see myself as pretty
NOT EVEN ONCE
not even decent
Not even reasonable
I just. see. UGLY.
and ashamed of my face,
And ashamed of my obsession
With cosmetics
Because it is like the only medicine they made
To fix this affliction
Makeup can make up for how ugly I am
maybe it can fix me
maybe I won't hate myself anymore
but it never does
and I hate crying alone!

Break down the mirror, and break me down
brains in my hair and teeth at my wrists,
she said fourteen caps of alprazolam gave her all she needed
she needs a new world, a new earth, a new ruler, that's what she needed-
I told you it wasn't meant to be this way, i was meant to be the prettiest
but girls with thickened veins and thickened wrists are destined for the bridge edge
My silver smiler body double told me to cut out the poison in my veins
and guess what I did it I did it I did it again
tell them your name, dysmorphia, tell them all what you think of me -
start the car and run me over, honey.

Today my feet did not want to touch the ground
My face did not want to break away from my pillow,
My body did not want to move from its embrace with the mattress.
Tomorrow doesn't look good for the floor either.

Today I want to sleep for a very long time,
I don't want to have to wake up until I'm really not tired,
I don't want to have to face another day of fatigue.
Tomorrow doesn't look good for being awake either.

Today I don't want to eat anything,
I don't want to drink,
I don't want to have to wake up my digestive system.
Tomorrow doesn't look good for my stomach either.

Today I'm not feeling up to changing,
I don't want to wear my outdoor clothes,
I don't want to tie my shoe laces.
Tomorrow doesn't look good for my wardrobe either.

Today I want to be depressed,
I want to lie in bed and wallow,
I want to feel sorry for myself because I am not important.
Tomorrow doesn't look good for feeling good either.

Today I don't want to be me,
I don't want to ever be me again,
I won't want to have to look in the mirror.
Tomorrow doesn't look good for my reflection either.