When I can't breathe or uncurl,
I will know that I am back,
back on track.

When I can only feel sharp beneath seas of cloth and downy white hairs,
I will know that I am getting closer to the goal that I can never reach,
even though my friends won't want to hug me because it will be painful for both of us.
It will be worth it, even when I've lost everyone because I couldn't be there.
It will tell me everything is back,
back on track.

You call it plummeting,
failing,
relapsing,
but I call it finally getting back on track.

Your intellect is
intimidating and you
do not seem to see.

He doesn't smile often,
and when he does it is flitting,
and even though I long to ask how he is doing,
I cannot seem to battle down
the commotion in my head and the terror in my chest
because I think he knows my secret
and I cannot put my fears to rest.
He never did anything wrong,
but I heard him say he might become a man of God,
and so often they decide that their beliefs are worthier than my rights,
so I still cannot stand near him without feeling drained
just to be filled up with dread and anxiety.
I hope that he has forgotten,
instead of just opting not to speak.

I didn't even know that I am lonely,
until I remembered that everybody still sleeps with the promise that they will see each other again,
and until I saw pictures of my friends that made me remember everything about them.

Their only friends are not endless rituals
and tears in the middle of the night,
or halfhearted struggles in a heartless fight.
They have companions to meet their ends,
the ones that used to be my friends.

Everybody that I love
is so far away that all I have of them is some debris in my mind,
crafted from memories,
of a friendship so kind, or at least one of a kind.

Just pretend that you don't see me
wringing my bleeding hands around my neck in the middle of class,
and just pretend that you can't see the bones in my back when I breathe quickly.

Act like you don't see the scars all over me,
and act like you don't see the blackness underneath my eyes
or the signs that I am slipping,
like my grades suffering and my work becoming sloppy.

Imagine to yourself that my home is happy,
and imagine that you do not know what is happening,
so you can reassure yourself that there is no help to be given.

Pain was never pretty,
illness was never "in,"
I'm not looking for anyone to save me,
I'd just like to make someone happy,
I'd just like to have a friend.
One who doesn't leave when my time with them has to end.

Sick was never jealousy envoking,
and crying till 2 A.M.
was a thought unvisited.
I don't long for someone to come along and hug me,
but I can still imagine
that somebody enjoys my company,
and that we can get lost in senseless fun.

When your body is under the weather,
your eyes are foggy and dead like leather,
and those eyes keep raining, pouring, and dribbling down the sides of your sunken face,
like it's a race to see which droplet will come in first place.

The pitter-patter on your lap of the rain falling from above
feeds a pool forming between your thighs and your stomach.

The weathermen keep on reporting storms.
At least you have some warning.
The lightning flashes and blinds you,
and the thunder clashes and deafens you.

You can't hear the world around,
you're too drowned.

I want to blame
The Domino Effect
but truly this is up to me
when I let the flood free
of painful things and angry things
til I can't think and it flashes back to me
to start a fight

I don't really want attention
I just wanna waste away all emotion
before I gotta talk
to people
and walk
around school
and before I gotta come home and struggle
to maintain my temper
and to keep out of trouble

I feel that I am the last thing on their mind.
That is not said as if I am the last thing that they think of at night.
I am saying this as if I am the last in the queue of those they deem important. I'm the least concerning subject.
So ask anyone and everyone and everyone and nobody (with a clear conscience) would object.

I can tell you now, so often I tend to see them.
They occupy the empty pocket between bone and brain,
and they fill the blue emptiness of sky reflected in my eyes.
Are they so oblivious? Do they just ignore this?

For however awkward I already am, and probably will always be,
they never seem to notice how I start to stutter more,
or how I try to disappear when they're near.

I stare, though, it must be clear as day.
I take in details about their face, so familiar that if I tried I could trace it into the clay.
But at the same time, if I try to remember, I picture nothing but their gaze.

I'm not lovesick for the girl,
who I call adorable.
I don't feel shy for the older one who hugs me and smiles my way in the hallways.
I don't pine for the boy who I admire for his personality at times.

I think I love the one who held purple petals out to me as a joke,
but I stuck beside for the night, still with other friends but always staring at him.
I think this time I'm just feeling for someone who caught me off guard when I realized what I've been thinking.