Eat, drink - and savour body
It burns - and freshly blushing
Of ankles, knees - the jutting crags
Eat, drink - get lost - in moaning
Of own thoughts - heads' fog
Is rooted deep in groin
Eat, drink - yell over famine
With belt and taunt
Draw tight the ego's thirst
For thinking - shame yourself
For narrative of truth - give up
And joyfully accept
The informational injection
Comparison, identifying, drama
"I believe!" - a dream forgotten
Neglected honour - recognizing game
Unheard is role - a viewer
Yet - to the wall of lies - another burst
"Why do you peel own skin away?!"
Waste life attire
Save in affliction - reason
When silence in the head
Shrieks - "Jump! Take step! Put hanging!"
Just watch - and call for an encore
Applaud - from stage - from audience
Out of theatre - "Louder! Louder!"
With tears - splutter

TW: B100d, other

Nights spent carefully watching as his smile turned to ice
Nights waiting for the call that I knew would not come
A butterfly that grew bright, was fated to fall and die
Leaving behind a world full of flowers and love
From their perspective at least
Nights that echoed from my thoughts racing from his words
Nights that screamed in my ear, the night sky wrinkling in my palms
Nights that I stayed unaware, foggy memories of terror and hurt
Staying at the window, watching for lights, fighting to stay calm
What have I done when his smile had grown too small?
What have I done, when he had filled up his skin and his walls
With drawings I couldn’t stop?
Bl00d is Ill-fated when staining the hands of a civilian
Easily turning a human into a monster that twists behind the mirror
A world full of people but still I thought you were one in a million
Biting back, I thought in a way that didn’t make it any clearer
But yet
The bl00d drips
My fingers become frozen ice that doesn’t feel, a world that seems so unsafe
I don't wait for your breath that has become empty
I had thought it was you all along, but the story is told in many faces
The ink that ran from our eyes were different colors, and I saw mine as black
But I know now it is red like the bl00d in your veins
Spilling out onto the carpet, spilling out of your head
It’s hard not to feel insane
And that smile, I realized, was just carved into your cheeks
The other side of the water, was not just my reflection
It was a strange thing to be seen…

We always joked
That overdosing
Is the way to do it

Pop
Pop
Pop the pills
Just

Pop
Pop
Pop the pain away
Until

Pop
Pop
Pop you're in the clouds
Forever

Bettie
The most emo girl
I’ll ever know
Bettie
Her smile was a bright light
At the Darkroom
petite and sweet
cute to boot  

Her kind green eyes
found mine
Full of tears and fear
mascara smeared

She took me by the hand
She led me to the sound
She pulled me in to dance
and sing along to mad songs
Played by her man and his band
He planned a fallacy

We sang loud, we screamed
We jumped up and down
And we were okay, lost in a rare moment
But we woke up with no voice
Our hearts crushed, was it lust?
Were we really stupid *****?
Perky **** with cotton candy wits, huh?

It’s a good thing
you’re so pretty
Because you’ll find
a man to marry
As long as you keep
Your mouth shut
and your legs open
Not too much
Not too little

I wish I could take away your pain

Because it’s deep in me too
#MeToo was too late for you
It’s tragic it’s too late to relate
kindred spirits separate  
No click click to get on with
Left here holding the pain.
They say you’re at peace
I hope you are, you deserve it

It was too much and it had to stop
No one would listen
now there is a spot missing
For you on stage
We should be singing together
About how we’ve had enough  
We should be screaming together
About their gaze and graze
their misogynistic
Mind games that
Stole our innocence
and buried us in shame
You should still be here
Putting men in their places
I say wait, my heart breaks
anger rises because
Another one skates away
They should be gone
They should live with shame
But they just skate away

Why do I only relate with the ones below?
Suicidal role models
The world cries when it’s too late
I heard your song but was too far away

Bark like a dog that can’t bite
You’re a rerun, redundant
Idiot shouting at staples on trees
Guns to a pillowfight, pillows to a massacre
Why can’t you learn the perfect place to sit

Your eyes look handsome when your mouth is closed
Talk until your lungs become heavy with air
But know that not a soul listens to you freely
Your only audience is a captive one
We encourage you to try anyway
Someone out there must be into that sort of thing

Try drinking and feeling more and less
Be the coat hanger that everyone else loves
Talk to me, I want to know how you’re running
I don’t want to hear about your prosthetics
But the guy standing next to you sounds nice

Have you tried to end your life lately?
You might smile more if you think about it daily
We liked you more back when you were smaller
When you were close to the edge of that thought
When our clothes didn’t fit you
When we liked you even less

Life keeps striking,
one blow after another,
until my ribs feel hollow,
my spirit bruised.

And then it comes back,
that thought.
Quiet at first,
like a shadow in the corner.
Then louder,
pressing against my chest.

I wrestle with it.
I want to live,
to hold on,
to find a way through,
but that thought
keeps circling back,
like a tide that refuses to rest.

No one sees the battle.
No one understands
the weight of a war fought
in silence.

So I write it down,
trap it in ink,
so it won’t devour me whole.

I am still here,
not because it’s easy,
but because I keep choosing
life,
again,
and again,
even with that thought
always at the door.

I want the suffering to end.
I'm sick of the flashbacks,
the cutting,
the pain.
Everything that life brings me,
I'm ******* tired of.

I want the hallucinations to go away.
It scares me to hear someone call my name,
or to see someone stand by my door,
only to realize there's no one there.
It almost makes me sad
that my brain made it up
and none of it was real.

I want to feel free again.
I'm done sleeping on my parents' bedroom floor,
and being consumed by an addiction to self destruction.
I want to be free of thoughts and compulsions to harm myself in any way I can.

I want it all to end.

Warning- This poem is about suicide and may be triggering to some.

I hope you'll miss me when I'm gone.
I don't know if you will,
or if you even care about me at all,
but if you do,
I hope you'll miss me when I'm gone.

I hope you'll come to my funeral.
Maybe you'll bring me flowers,
or cry while I lay lifeless in my casket.
I hope you'll miss me when I'm gone.

If I survive I hope you'll visit me in the hospital.
Even though you've really hurt me,
it would be nice to see your face again,
so I know that you care.
I hope you'll miss me when I'm gone.

Warning-This poem contains themes of self harm and suicide.

What will it take for you to finally care?
You never cared to ask how I was doing,
and then when I ended up in the hospital,
you were all over me,
asking questions,
and telling me I was going to be okay.

Will it take my suicide for you to admit you were wrong for what you did to me?
You'll keep lying to our friends
until the day I die.
Then, you'll feel too guilty to keep this lie going,
and you'll cave in.

Will it take me carving deep wounds into my skin for you to say you're sorry?
When you see the cuts
I know you'll ask me if I'm okay because your mom is worried about me.
You know I'm not,
but we're both liars here.

Now I lay here,
in my bed, covered in my own blood,
wondering
what will it take
for you to listen to my problems,
for you to apologize,
for you to care,
for you to realize you were a terrible friend to me.

Warning-This poem contains themes of suicide, self harm, and depression.

My first depressive episode was last May.
My friend was on the phone with my boyfriend, and I worried he wouldn't date me for much longer.
I didn't even like boys,
I just wanted to feel loved.
I sat in the rain and thought about killing myself.
"What is happening to me?" I asked myself.
Maybe it was jealousy,
Maybe it was my period.
But I knew there was something wrong.

I had another depressive episode in August.
I couldn't stop thinking about self harm and suicide.
I tried to enjoy my vacation in Washington at my grandma's house,
but it was hard to enjoy while I was silently suffering.
I relapsed on self harm after that.

It happened again in November.
I filed a suicide report on myself at school.
Even though I had a school play that day, and a vacation later in the week, I couldn't bring myself to want to live.
I was pulled into the counselor's office at school and got sent home.
I cried on the couch when I got back home.

Again in December.
I was used to this by now.
I banged my head on my bedframe because I so desperately wanted to punish myself.
I was stuck in flashbacks of my trauma.
"If this is my life," I'd tell myself,
"then I don't want to be here anymore."
I cut myself on the train tracks and visualized myself getting hit by a train.
What made it worse was being cheated on.

The worst of my depression was in February.
I was hospitalized on Valentine's Day.
I had a plan to run in front of a train on the 15th,
and I had to sleep on my parents' floor so I wouldn't hurt myself
until I was admitted to a residential treatment center.

Now, I'm on better medications to help with my depressive episodes.
I'm still not perfect,
and not necessarily thriving or doing well,
but I'm doing better.
Thankfully.