Why is giving up so sweet to taste
like cold cream in strong brewed coffee,
I wish that same strength for me,
but instead the way the milk,
though bad for me I know,
mixes in like December's first snow,
leaves me in a trance,
I am frozen in the road,
the way ahead I will not go,
because I have never tasted happiness
and giving up is just too sweet

there is a crack running the length of Main Street;
when it rains the crack fills and flows like a river.
Tonight it is raining
Oil slicks on the road reflect street lamps;
artificial Northern Lights.

He hadn’t paid his power bill, so
he leads me through his apartment by the light on his phone.
In his bedroom I see the mess even in the almost dark.
His bed is a mattress on the floor;
sheets barely cover it.
He lets go of my hand, pulls his shirt over his head.
The light flickers as the phone battery runs low;
he puts the phone away.
He undresses me.
In the dark I stand, naked, in front of him.

But then I reach for this zip along my side.
The zip begins under my arm and runs the length of my torso.
There is another along the length of either leg — hip to ankle.

I step out of my skin.

A river runs out of me like the one in the crack along the sidewalk.

I’m much smaller now
                                                  much more myself.

Remember
Training
Is Your Sacred Weapon Against the Unknown
Use It Wisely
shhh It Will Guide You Thru This Test of Fortitude and Challenge
Few Are Those Who Find and Make their Way Both

From Creek Beds Dried
To  Mountains
In Mourning and Back Again

Do Not Be Fooled By Visions
For You Truly Have Your Own

Eyes Of God
Ever Present
For Her Is Only Ones

eating disorders are a simile for a coffin.
it hurts to breathe, with 6 feet of dirt pressed on your chest,
6 days of emptiness pressed on your chest.
your mother buried you the day you stopped eating,
your eyes are still open but she does not see past your pale skin,
frail bones,
hollow stomach.
this door does not open from the inside out,
you missed a chance to grab the hand that tried to help you.
if you had known the late nights she spent sobbing over losing you,
before you were even gone,
would you still have chased this emptiness?
the day you lusted for hollowness rather than wholeness,
you squeezed your mothers hand,
and told her to save her love for the living.

I’ve got those pants which used to hug my legs very tightly, some time ago
They were warm and comfortable and they’d snuggle up to each other

But today exact these same pants refused to recognize my legs
They started to let go of them

They observe them now, from a distance, and give them a strange look
They’re scared to touch my legs

They’re scared of those cold and sharp bones
Scared of the blue skin and of my fine hair on them

Bones cold and sharp, which used to be my legs, have become crutches
But they work
Bones, cold and sharp, which might snap in half with every movement
But still they’re whole

And like ghosts, invisible, I walk with those crutches through the hallway
Cross the streets of my hometown
And go for a run every now and then
I get past windows that show no reflection
Past people who look at me in disgust

And when I’m home, the pants slip off by themselves
So that I stand here, naked and barefoot and exposed without any cloth
Only to lift those cold and sharp bones one more time
To make a step forward
Onto a scale which will measure my self-worth in kilograms and make my bony knees wobbly again
Because suddenly, the pants fit again, suffocating my legs with their tightness.

Someone knocked on my door the other day
A woman I didn’t recognize
Long limps, tiny frame
Her eyes pierced right through me and it hurt
Her fingers were ice-cold when she touched me
Pushing me away to enter the room
She examined the kitchen, the sink, the fridge
And I could only wonder what she was looking for
For a second I thought that she might be hungry
But her lips were pressed so tightly together
That I forgot about it immediately
When she looked into the mirror she saw me standing right behind her
And in a state of both frustration and excitement
I kicked against the glass with my foot
And it was not the glass,
But the woman,
That broke.

I am full of demons. They live in my throat and my blood and my ears whispering to me so quiet that it sounds like my own thoughts.
2. The monsters are waiting. They lurk in the shadows and I can feel their eyes on me, their hands all over pulling me into the darkness it takes all of my strength to reach my fingertips to the light
3. I am fading. Memories of past selves disappear as every day passes, memories slipping away I can never remember what I've forgotten until it's too late
4. It feels like it's been years. We pass each other in the halls and i can't look you in the eyes without thinking of kissing you. It's so strange to dream of having someone back you never had in the first place
5. You haunt my dreams. I see the contour of your body and your hands and I reach out for you but I am always just not close enough and your hands slip away from mine and you dance with him instead
6. I was never good enough. No matter how I tried to purify my bloodstream and my skin and my stomach and my heart I was tainted, born into sin and unable to escape it. My demons live in every cell and I can't avoid them the same way you avoid looking me in the eyes
7. I can never pass on my genetics. I am burdened by a curse coded into every ounce of me and I can never pass this down. The thought of my children crying themselves to sleep with bloodstains on their hips haunts me and I realize that my biggest fear is being as ignorant as my parents were with me
8. I can never be loved. At least not totally. Although my illness is evil it is still part of me and no one can love depression. I will always be loved despite my sickness and I will never be cured.
9. I hurt everything I touch. My hands must be coated in poison, everyone I love is burdened by my fingerprints. I want to stop, to free them but I am too weak to leave them alone. So I take them with me until they are as shattered as I am, broken and unholy.
10. I am what won't let me sleep. All of these things that make my skin crawl are part of me, implanted deep within my bones and I cannot get rid of them. I am a monster because I am haunted by them, they will forever be part of me.

after years of being told how good my body was
i went through puberty.

after years of being asked how much time i spent at the gym
i grew hips
and disconcerting  looks from grown men who thought my fifteen year old thighs were too thick to be sexualized.

after years of wearing sundresses
and being applauded for being the first girl in my grade to grow *****
my metabolism slowed down
and i was made to feel like a cowbell in the least practical sense of the word.

i was thirteen and hunched over a porcelain toilet bowl when i told my friend i had purged and she called me gross as if it wasn't because of feeling "gross" that i was there to begin with.

and i'd grown used to my good-gened friends with their tiny waists and size 32 jeans telling me they wanted to join a gym in hopes i'd run along and lose some weight.

because when i was 13 and weighed little enough to turn heads i felt empty while looking whole.

and when you're fat you can't have an eating disorder, because illness can be seen so how good of a job my ana was doing depended solely on how faint i felt by midday.

in a world where nobody buys magazines it's easy to pretend we don't care for skinny bodies anymore, but when every smartphone is linked to an instagram page and every newsfeed is filled with "slim thick baddies" you can't help but wonder.

if i were to feel physically full why am i so empty?
i cheated myself.
she probably went and cheated on me because my body wasn't slim-thick enough to eat.

and it's easy to say this doesn't apply to me when you see the pictures on the beach but you don't see me scrolling through pinterest at 2 in the morning looking at "How To Lose 10 kgs in 3 Days" posts.

if i were so lucky i'd be a success story and could probably post before and after pictures of my body but you can not hear the ache in my belly screaming at me that it'd rather just be cut off.

when i was fourteen i could no longer wear shorts in public because grown men with wives would turn and watch my thighs clip-clap together as i walked with my dad.
i was asking for it.
i resented summer and the fact that i'd run out of clean pairs of jeans to sweat in.

but if i dare love myself, what then? do i apologise to the girlfriends of the boys who visit me for coffee? do i drink coke light with my whiskey? do i start writing poetry?