"I liked your smile better
When you were younger,"
She said
I was tempted to ask why
But we both knew.

Across the table
my grandpa asks me why
i don't eat cinnamon toast crunch anymore.
The last time i saw them
i loved it so much
that he tried it, and got hooked
but now i don't touch it.
And i don't know how to tell him
why,
how to tell him
that the thought of all that sugar
paralyzes me.
So i just sit with my corn flakes,
avoid his eyes
and hope he doesn't notice
how desperately i wish i could eat it.

Maybe I'm just not meant to be small
or light
Maybe I'll forever exist outside of
what i have been taught is "beautiful"
Maybe some day I'll accept this
not today, maybe not for a while, but
I look forward to that day.

Who am i?
When the scars are stripped away
the obsessions gone
the compulsions unneeded
When i don't know the taste of serotonin on my tongue
the disappointment of looking in the mirror
or the bite of metal against my stomach
When i am myself again,
bare of the illnesses that have weighed me down
Who will i be?

i'm tired
i'm so ******* tired.
i didn't ask for any of it-
not the scars, not the pills,
not the anxiety
or obsession
or disordered thoughts
i never wanted this.
because when you're thirteen
you don't think that within the next three years
you'll have four mental illnesses.
nobody ever predicts that they'll have a collection of cuts,
of failed recoveries
and subsequent relapses.
nobody wants to be a burden.
nobody wants to be trapped in their own mind
and i can't tell if it's depression,
or the eating disorder
but God, i'm exhausted.
i don't want to carry this anymore.
(i never did.)

you ask for a definition
but does anything have a definition?
the universe
for example
is always changing
definitions don't account for change
therefore
the universe is undefinable
there is no definition for me
because of that same reason
i am always changing
and definitions do not account for change
i am undefinable
seven billion people in the world
and no definitions
capable of describing them
and their change
we are, all of us
undefinable
i am the gay girl,
the depressed kid
the photographer
but that will change
(maybe not the gay part)
everything else, though-
i will be in a better place
eventually
i don't know where that place is
or how people will try to define me
but truly
i am as vast
and as beautiful
and as undefinable
as the universe
and everything in it
we are undefinable.

I don't know much
except that when they call me "darling"
it feels like a warm blanket
And when their hands are in my hair
or scraping the back of my neck
so light it makes me shiver,
i think for the first time in too long
that i could die happy
I know that i want to spend my days laying with them,
laughing, teasing, but always
coming back to "i love you";
my nights holding on
sending one last text
before a sleep that gets me closer to seeing them again
I don't know much.
But I've already gone through a lot
and loving them is one of the only things
that i want to keep going through,
until i know them
and only them.

It's strange how healing works.
I still have pictures on my phone
from when scars were an angry red
before they faded to a softer,
paler reminder.
At the time i thought they would never fade
would always stay there,
just as they were-
I thought i would never fade either,
would never change
yet here i am
two or three years later
and a completely different person.
Not healed,
but the pain has faded,
just a bit.
My skin is no longer covered in red;
but i don't know who i am without it
honestly, I don't know who I'll be
once everything fades.

i have so much love,
for the world
for people
and no one
to take it

at this point,
i can't even tell
if it helps anymore
maybe
it's just a part of me
ingrained as deeply
as a love of stars
or running
until i can't breathe
just to drown out
the noise in my head
i have to wonder
will these scars
ever help?

i give so much
of my love to the world
that there isn't quite
enough left
for myself.

a year's worth of scarring
adorns my thigh,
lying there
a constant reminder
but they are also
a year's worth of happiness,
of friends,
of recovery,
of love.
they are from the year
that i wanted to die,
but now
they represent
another year
i have lived.

beneath me ice gives way-
i give up hope of day,
as i descend into the darkness

the edges start to fray
i fall, away, away;
water swirls, cold and heartless

heavy the pressure weighs
my mind in disarray
in the midst of blackness i see Death;

yet my fate is delayed,
my body not decayed,
and i will take one more breath.

75
beats per minute,
as calculated
by scientific studies
sometimes,
though,
it feels like
my heart disregards science entirely
in my worst moments
i might as well have been at 1,
not nearly dead
but certainly getting there
my heart still beats,
75 beats
(for the most part)
every minute
75 beats
as you are reading this,
as i wrote it
the average bpm
for an alive person

Ebony wings flapping,
It streaks across the sky
Free as a bird.

the contrast
between skin
and blood
is like night and day,
if only night
was red
running down thighs
and day
was tarnished
and pale.

today i learned
maybe, you can’t
fit two broken pieces
together,
and expect it to last.

am i enough?

i am still learning
the one thing
they never teach:
that grades-
more specifically
that one D
is not indicative
of my character.

i want to die.
i don't think
that i'm worth it
i know
it's not true.
i am a failure-
the voices in my head tell me
blades drop
and i listen
i love you,
people say
but do they?
the scars help,
i think
and as blood falls
i regret.

I would like to think
That stars are people
Long lost
Long forgotten
But still gazing down
Watching over us
Maybe someday
I will find out

i am not strong.
when people see my scars,
they think
that i crawled out of hell
even when demons
were dragging me down.
i barely made it out, though,
and those demons are still with me.
they are still present
in the scars on my thighs,
the pills that i take,
the nights i can't sleep
and nothing feels right
because,
really,
that hell was inside my head
and the demons
were my own thoughts,
ripping
and tearing
and pulling away at my sanity,
bit
by bit.
i am not strong,
but i'm strong enough
to keep fighting those demons,
every
single
day.

i stand on sheets of ice,
my cheeks the cold air bites
i wonder what happened;

to lead me here tonight
in the absence of the light
alone, and unhappy

there is no end in sight-
no land, safe and dry,
to rest my weary head on;

only coldness, and the quiet,
and my sadness, like a giant
what have i become?

Tonight,
I flew past city lights
That looked like stars
In an impossible constellation
And i thought
The world we've built for ourselves
Is beautiful,
And endless
Our own tiny universe.

tonight,
i walked in the snow
watched it drift down
and surround me,
listened to the silence.
as i stood there,
it seemed crazy
that i could ever want to leave
this beautiful world

i know the snow won't last, though
and as it melts
the fantasy will melt away with it
i hope the snow stays for a while,
if only so that i don't have to face real life again.

Red
Seeping down my thighs
Staining my skin,
Forming ridges
And valleys
Monuments
That only I can see
Attesting to what I've done

it's been months since everything shut down
months since i had an excuse to dress up
and i've been aching for a reason to put on a suit-
but not this.
never like this.
because i have to relearn to tie my black tie,
over a black shirt
under watery eyes.
it's been months since i dressed up,
years since the last funeral.
goodbye, friend.

i love you.
so, so much
isn't it enough
that i say that?
is it not enough for you,
that i just know?
you want reasons
so i give them to you:
my darkest nights,
when you were there for me
the shoulder of yours,
that i can always lean on
the way we talk,
and laugh,
and understand each other.
if that isn't love,
i don't know what is
but i do know
that i love you.

colors blend together
beautiful and inseparable
an unbreakable community,
forged through years
of sorrow and hardship
but also joy and triumph
flags wave as colors fill streets
pride radiating throughout
we are here,
and we are queer.

I am a static being,
Words
And thoughts
Drifting through my head,
Buzzing
Without any meaning
My limbs itch for motion
But nothing feels right
So instead I sit,
Listening to the buzz,
Noiseless sound
And wishing
That just once-
I could tune in to real life.

I want to grow old,
If not just so that
I can have kindness in my eyes
And wrinkles
From all the years
I have defied the odds

i can't tell you that you'll be okay
because that would be lying
i don't know if anything
will be okay,
and honestly
i can't say for sure that you'll make it to college
but i can say this.
i can tell you that you're strong
that you've made it this far
that you are loved,
even if you don't think so
i can't predict the future
i can't tell you when you'll have your next breakdown
i can tell you, though,
that you can make it through
the future doesn't matter,
not right now
and you have made it through breakdowns before
so prove yourself to the universe
once again.
prove that you are a survivor,
determined to live
even when your own mind
is telling you to die
even if you're not okay,
if in ten years
you're still in the same dark place-
that doesn't matter,
not right now, at least
right now
you are alive
you are still here, against the odds
you aren't okay,
and i'm not going to lie to you
but you are getting there.
slowly,
and painfully,
but the end is in sight.
so please,
be there to see it.

survive.

dear _,
you are my stars
i can only hope
that eventually i will be yours

my hands know
the motion to draw blood
better than anything
i've learned
in the past few years

i've forgotten
how to express myself
other than that
i'm so ******* exhausted
and just once
just for a few seconds
i want to be okay again.

i will write
entire essays
about honesty,
then lie
whenever i am asked
if i'm okay

i feel like i'm trying
to put together a puzzle,
except the pieces are serotonin
and there always seems
to be just one or two missing,
but all it takes is those few missing links
for the whole thing
to fall apart
and i have to start over.
i've attempted this puzzle
for years, again and again-
but sometimes, i have to wonder
will i ever have all the pieces?

i am still learning to love myself,
and this body
that has brought me through everything
(scars & all).
i am still picking up the pieces,
finding parts of myself
i thought were lost.
for the longest time,
i thought I wouldn't make it-
sometimes I still don't.
but I am still here.
still breathing,
as much as it may hurt.