No longer memories,
just empty scenes in my mind
endlessly replaying
im ready to move on
these fragments of broken glass keep cutting me so deep,
rupturing my veins and spilling out my bones,
just let me go and let me be
i wanna get out
i wanna be free
its like a record player
stuck on repeat
im running in place
im running alone
I see new scars
on top of scars,
on top of scars
each time i look they multiply
each time i look i wanna tear my skin
piece by piece
take it away
because the more i learn to love myself
the more it hurts to see.

I am Heavy-lidded tonight,
Heavy-lidded
and inscrutable in my childhood.

My childhood that was spent hysterical in airing cupboards,
Where I wept unashamedly to the fixed God
And the stained glass, rose-hewn Angels of churches
That reeked of oak and holy water.
Where I sat in the trees, high on life and vanila-blue ice cream
And with knees skinned by the ****** pathways of woods
Or the safe gravels of playgrounds.

Where sunbursted mangoes dripped with musky-sanded chlorine
And the sun-hot metal gates clanged shut in the holiday winds.
Where rocks were thrown by fated children
And paper-cheap candy wrappers filled up plastic trash cans.
Where strange, money-minded housewives gaggled and giggled
With their ******-white teeth
And reflected my mother' s bipolar poverty
In the lenses of their plastic sunglasses.
Where my self-hemmed summer dresses were stained
With green and brown and red finger paint
As the days outside grew warmer
And the inside self grew older,
Colder.

Where I was punished for expression of the self
And confined to the sanatorium
Or the offices of Moloch's servants
On a sun-stippled day in May
Where my scrap-bruised hands
Were bandaged by the words of the Real World
And threatenings of expulsion.
Where I hid behind felted display boards
On a landing somewhere near Neverland,
And lay and listened to the friend-fuelled ramblings of lost boys
Who sat and smoked in dormitories
And hallucinated Peter Pan.
Where I wrote self-indulgent fuckery in toilets
And drew crude artistries on mirrors with lipstick
And contemplated
Amo
Amas
Amat
As I sat and stared at my own disassociated hands.

Where paper aeroplanes flew and were thrown
By hungover kids in threadbare jumpers
With chewed cuffs and prefect badges,
Where holy Evian was poured over my head
After a long last day under a white marquee,
Where I disassembled pencil sharpeners with iron-smelling razor blades
and violated erasers at an exam hall desk in a stormy June.

Where I contemplated death;
Sang hymns in the darkness of my bedroom,
Took a blade to my flesh
Like the soulless piece of meat
That I believed myself to be.
Where I fell in love;
Hurt myself
More than anyone else ever did.
Where I read,
Where I wrote tear stained elegies
To my idols under the earth
And prayed that I
Would last
Just one more day.

I fight with my hands
so they do not begin
to trace deep rivers on my stomach
that always lead to my hipbone basin

I flex my palms
and admire how my knuckles protrude
when I relax them again

My cheek bones can be felt
with a light pressure
and everlasting insecurity
but my chin never thins
quite the way I want

I pull my hair elastic forward
so that it sits right before
my perfect wrists

I admire my knees
as I sit in a tight skirt,
eyes trailing upward,
smile getting smaller,
thighs getting bigger

I tell myself I am better
and then I am alone

It’s not over until all the crows
fall from holes opening in the clouds--
sunlight washing cracked concrete white.

I refuse to let your actions fade to static until
the last ca-caw echoes on parkways silent
as the attempted protests of the girls you *****.

I could count five of them by the time I left, yet
none seemed able to open their stitched lips
despite my rallies and strong-worded speeches.

Maybe that’s because you laughed at them, too,
when they threatened to file police reports.
But five years have past since then,

and the rage freezing me from the inside out
has begun to fade, slowly, thawed under
a sun growing steadily more yellow--warm,

my friends always said it would be
if only I would just give it a chance--
all the crows are falling.

I constructed my sister’s portrait in three parts:
her eyes painted full color, bright with oil,
nose in colored pencil, a few shades more sallow,
and her mouth lightly smeared No. 2 pencil,

because I wasn’t sure how to form the words
for a police report never filed against you.
And sometimes I pass you on my way to town,
you still driving that ugly, blue pickup
with that same old sneer on your pig-like face--

I want to scream out my window the way I did
when I dreamed you came to me years in the future,
asking how I’ve been, some lame excuse to bury
your immorality with rice-paper niceties. I remember
my throat tore and bled as if I’d swallowed broken
metal wire as I repeated over and again:
Do you know what you did?
Do you know what you caused?

I constructed my sister’s portrait with three bits of paper
ripped apart and glued crudely together again.

Dearest friend, parent, lover
Whoever might be reading this
I'm sorry i couldn't stay strong.
I'm sorry i couldn't stand it anymore
It's not anyones fault, i just wasn't meant to be here.
Just like those flowers that never bloom. They just grow and starts hanging a bit, then dies.

Dear younger siblings.
Don't look up to me, look up to people like daddy or momma, they're happy, i weren't. One life lesson i've learnt is that happiness doesn't come without courage, but with too much courage you'll get tired and let go when you finally get there, and you'll end back where you started.

Dear older "sister"
You know who you are and you're probably reading this right now, smiling at how i mention you as my sister. You're the best person to ever be in my life, and even though you told me a couple of years ago that you were lesbian i never rethought the meaning of your hugs, cause i know we're sisters.
If it wasn't for you i would have done this a lot earlier so thank you.

Dear parents.
Don't cry, i'm not worth your beautiful tears..  I have nothing more to say than i know you lost me, but don't lose courage.

Dear best friend.
Thank you for always being there.
Thank you for telling me that everything will be alright.. It just hurts me to say that you were wrong.. And i'm sorry cause i know this will bring you pain.. But i know you have some other. Nice friends who'd support you.

Dear stranger.
I'm sorry if i was goind to know you in my no longer exisisting future.. You're better off without me anyways..

Dear myself.
I'm sorry i can't hold on anymore, i know that you had your happy times, and that a lot of people longed for your life, but i couldn't stand it anymore..

Dear person
I'm sorry the voices became too much.
I'm sorry i ran out of place to make scars.. I'm sorry i couldn't stand this inner pain anymore.. Dear person.. I'm sorry.. Goodbye..

I'm not BABE
or *******
or PRINCESS
I'm not the names you throw at me from your car window
I'm not HONEY
or SWEETIE
or LOOK AT ME WHEN IM TALKING TO YOU *****
Harassment. A 10 letter word with thousands of synonyms
each one like a knife to my skin
each one a scar I can point to and show
"this is where I stopped trusting"
and
"this is when I started running"
Never was I prepared for a life where Im told to be timid
To shrink myself down
To be humble so that men aren't threatened
To never speak my mind and to laugh at everything he says
To always carry my keys in my hand like they are a weapon
To never show my skin and that its my fault if I'm taken advantage of because "boys will be boys"
We live in a world where the female body is fetishized
Where women are seen as "liars" if they wear makeup and "lazy" when they don't
Where girls in school are being removed from class because their tank top straps aren't three fingers wide as if making sure that men are comfortable is more important than an education.
The overarching misogyny that plagues women everyday
That makes them see themselves as the "second class ***" will always be apparent
Unless we make a change.
So no
I will not SMILE
or BE NICE
I will tear
And destroy
And break
And smash
I will fight.

he whispered his affections like an apology
cooling down her heated skin with the chill of the winter inside his chest
he gave her words of gold
she was bronze at her best
he placed sandbags on her shoulders and demanded her to take flight
she didn't think love was supposed to be feel like a bear trap
he tells her his knuckles were a paintbrush
the black and blue were his colors of choice
her skin was a ever healing, walking canvas of pale colors