You never think you'll start.
And then you do, and you think you'll never stop.
Sometimes you just wish everything would stop.
But it doesn't. And it can't. You know that.
So you quit.
A week. A month. Maybe even two.
Yet slowly you feel this pressure,
This constant nagging of unspoken emotion.
Maybe you don't acknowledge it yet, but you will.
And then all of a sudden it all explodes.
You're standing there. Breaking down; again.
Drowning under it all.
So you take your pail, throwing water out of this sinking boat.
A desperate, meaningless attempt to stay.
Blade against skin

my wrists ache with desire and these lungs hitch
and heave with each sickening sob.
as my body begs to feel,
and my heart begs to not.

— to feel everything and nothing at once

Somber silence
    Cascading
          Encapsulating

Corrupt me
    Defile me
         Persuade me
in to capitulation
into your loving
              ....warmth:
Enveloping
     Entwining
            Embracing

this is not pulling the trigger
this is waving the white flag
on the ship that has long since been

Sailing then
            Sinking and
I would like to stay afloat
      Yet drift far enough away that
I no longer have to see the shore that can

Chew me up
       Spit me out
              Swallow me whole

lure me with lullabies in to the dark
this never ending tunnel of
fabricated blithe
hammer chest  in my ears
pounding to the rhythm of

You & I. Together again:
      Crevasse canvas of
             Euphoric enigma
                    Dazed desires

A sea-sick stomach will steady
        Storms and speculations
               Heartbeat acceleration
                    Black ocean; destination

Repent
     Reclaim
          Relapse.
my love has never failed me.

Crying on the couch
thinking in circles,
when I look down to my phone.
It has an open, blank, message,
to my drug dealer.
"Woh, how did that get there?"
I close the message.

That was close.

Knowledge of Self, merely an assumption?
Better, or so I thought,
Failing hard, falling harder.

I burned brightly, burning through bridges,
Boundaries, and borders.

The path I walked was ashen,
In the wake of cinder,
The relics of the past.

Change, hubris aside, was shallow,
Was not the core of Flesh,
Just the Husk of Solitude.

I fell to the Rage, that desperate rage.
So eager and volatile.
Hidden in the shadows, in plain sight,
For the time I'd both welcomed and feared.
That explosion of otherness,
A disillusioned self.

Trauma lingers in a double edged blade,
Wounding the wielder and the wounded.
Neither in blood, thankfully so,
But battered pride, twist the ego.

Roots have dug into my brain sending
Echoes of a specter that
Latched onto me years ago
Always there that haunting presence in my mind
Persuading my broken thoughts into
Succumbing to the restless itch that I've
Endlessly avoided

It starts with a slip,
A turn of the cheek.
Simply forgetting to fit,
A meal for your body to keep.

You see, at this point,
It isn’t really starving.
For I forget only when I’m not hungry.
But the problem is,
I’m so used to being hungry
That I can’t tell the difference.

I thought I was better,
Until my boyfriend asked why he’s never seen me eat.
Until I was asked when the last time I ate was.
Until I faint, and I’m reminded to eat.

But now when I eat,
I have an Apple.
But I get sick,
Because it was too much food.

I can’t keep anything down,
So I have no choice but to not eat.

And so the cycle repeats.

I’m falling down again
I can feel my bones solidify into stone
My body feels heavy once more
This time is terrifying
I know what’s to come
This time I feel like screaming
This time I want to run

It's been a back and forth motion:

losing
  gaining
losing
  gaining
losing
  gaining
  maintaining
losing

for nearly a decade.

I can't seem to find* my way back up from this downward spiral
and I'm losing more than mass as I descend.

I don't have anyone close enough to stop me. Not that I'd let them anyways.

I'm going to keep
losing and
losing and
losing.

I'll turn sideways and disappear.
Shrivel up into .nothing.

And maybe then,
   just then,
I might feel valid.

(*correction: I can but I refuse to.)

i can only find the open palms of my demons in that red mist, the ones that once held my face in a much harsher way than you do now. your calloused hands feel like heaven instead of the hell that slept in the creases of their fingerprints. sometimes i fall too close and i see their blackened eyes that replay childhood traumas that i have spent years repressing with self-destructive behaviours and alcohol. your own remind me of the rivers i could drown myself in but i must remind myself that diving in will only give me peace, not death, though it feels like death whenever they're not in my sight. sometimes i think about hurting myself again but then i remember the claws of those monsters and how they can't compare to your nails tickling at my back in the late of the night where theirs would be cutting me open. i don't ever want to be in their grip again. never again. never.