Treasure chest

Most days I imagine I will be happy
Someday
In another pocket of time
Where days radiate with warm sun
Where mornings bring shimmering hope and the promise of a new day

But other days I imagine
That even the sharpest sense of a purpose
Will simply not be enough
To coax me from disappearing
Into the gaping hole in my chest
That consumes everything in sight
In search
Of something

I imagine
That my lover will bore me
That I will untangle myself slowly
Annoyed
By too warm embraces

needing to breathe the cool air

My only reprieve
From a perfectly curated treasure chest of suffocating
Happiness
That I cannot wait to hold

Left behind

I’m tired of being other people’s lesson
I’m ready to be a blessing
Not a cautionary tale of how things can go wrong
Or someone’s haphazard first
I no longer wish to be used in that manner
Not some distant figure from the past brought up casually in a funny story
And forgotten just as quick
A dismissal of my existence here and now
I don’t want to be a used to
Not some hazy sillhouette with only a name and disaster attached
I don’t want to feel erased anymore
Because of how often I’ve been left bereft
Like a ball of yarn that has been cut open
To leave a million splaying ends undulating
That my shaky fingers couldn’t possibly tie back together
I’m tired of tying knots that only end up loosening once more

I want to be real and present
With someone
Or people
Other than myself
To be wanted now
To be the happy ending
For someone
Anyone

Keep looking

I search for power
Because love does not exist.
Or atleast it does not for me.
There is only comfort
With those who you can bear the most of yourself to
Those who are just as twisted as you are and will therefore be unafraid of your truest form
A monster
That feeds off of unhappiness
That is jealous
That betrays others
Find those who will tolerate you the most when you are your worst self and there you have it
This love you speak of

The truth

Sometimes you let yourself die in a lot of ways
Starve your body and your mind and your soul
Because nothing you have to nourish them with is enough
I’m so lost I can’t even choose something to eat from the fridge
I’m so hurt I stopped believing in humanity and goodness
I’m so weak
I want to sleep all the time
But everytime I do I feel time slipping away
I can’t get it back
I’m being thrust forward into a future that’s going to look exactly like my present because I’m not ready for it
I’m so exhausted I can’t even put on the common pretenses
Hi how are you doing where are you going
I can’t pretend to care
I can’t focus to do any work
I want to lock myself here
I need to clean my room
But it looks so much like my mind
Maybe I like it like that
So I can truly wallow in my own dirty pit of despair
Rub my face in the garbage and mud
Breathe it all in and tell myself I feel better
Type until my knuckles grind to a creaking halt
Stare at the white screen until my eyes twitch and tear up with red flavoured anguish
It’s all I can do to avoid thinking about the seed of loneliness that has been growing in me for years
Slinking its green tenticles for vines around me
Whispering that I’m not good enough
That nobody wants me
That I am not loved even by myself
That I am not beautiful
It is popular to disregard these things but never easy

Again

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
The tears that will not come out
In the early morning
Because you stayed up all night
Thinking.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
Stripped bare but the heat is still unbearable
Sweaty palms reaching for a window
For air

It wasn’t supposed to be like this
Crooning in the background
From music
That’s supposed to make you feel better

It wasn’t supposed to be like this
Fighting the same fight
As before
Just in a different place

It wasn’t supposed to be like this
Wondering where it all went wrong
Wondering if you could have done better
Wondering if it will ever change

You were never supposed to think that it wasn’t supposed to be like this.

Guard your heart

Guard your heart
Whatever it takes
Spread yourself wide infront of it
When the thiefs come calling with sly smiles and greasy lies
Do not let it go
Grab onto it tight
Until your hands shrivel and lose life
Until your face shakes from the sheer force
Until you question what it was all for

Guard your heart
Until you cry out in anguish with hot tears streaming angrily down your cheeks
Until you fall to your knees offering up your bloody hands in desperation
Until you lose all hope

Guard your heart
Until you thrash wildly in your bed at night
Until others wonder what has become of you
Until your sunken eyes tell the harrowing story of your pain

Know this
If you let it slip
And fall
You will know the mistake you have made
When another picks it up slowly from the ground
And looks in your eyes holding it as tightly as you should have
They own you now
And they never give it back willingly
Now you must fight

Mirror

I forgive people when I see them eat.
They become reflections of myself
Hungry
Weak
Human.
They need just as I do. The shovelling of mouthfuls like the desparity of want
The desparity of want with no satisfaction
Just like me
Wretched with needs
Wants
All the same
Intertwined
Until there is no difference
Until the lines blur into a dark abyss of desires
That consumes us
While we eat.

Selfish

You don’t understand how I can be so swift with my love
Give it up one moment and the next withdraw

making you question if it was ever there
But it all makes sense in my head
I have all my reasons lined up
You just can’t see them
And I know that must be hard for you
But it’s easy for me
And that’s what I care about most these days

Be wary

It’s surprising how much you love people when you harm them. Or is it guilt? Or is it the fear of losing them? All you know is that it swells in your chest as tears swell and choke their way up to your throat. Sometimes you do something small. You say you’re hurting because of how they are hurt but the truth is that it’s because of how much they mean to you. And the more they mean to you, the more devastating it is to wrong them. It’s as if you are doing it to yourself. They cry, you cry. They are wounded, you run to nurse them. This kind of love is all consuming. It is dangerous. And if not handled with care, it can kill you.

A gift

I am not okay
I haven’t been for a long time
But I’m trying to be
Why does it take everything I have to get out of bed in the morning
Why am I always on the verge of tears
It’s as if my body does not have the strength to exist
My shoulders are weak
My back caves in
My core is jelly
My bodily integrity-these skin and bones-shudder at the mere thought of life
I never know when I will begin to decay
It could be the first time in the day that I sense judgement from someone
Everytime someone looks at me for a smidge too long I think they can see everything
As if my existence screams out my insecurities for the world to have at it
I get defensive
I’m never comfortable
I hope for empty streets so I don’t have to have anyone look at me
I realise that it is unlikely that people could sense this much
But when I don’t know something I always assume the worst
I am so disatisfied that I believe everyone must see it
I don’t know when I began to fear people
When I began to see them as things that can make you happy only for a time
Never as long as you want or need
To me any dysfunction is dysfuntional
But that’s not how human relationships work
I search for perfection and fall in and out of love in accordance
I know my own shortcomings but refuse to accept them in others
It’s a disease
I must learn
I must build
Everything of mine
So that I am not afraid
Of getting hurt
Because to be hurt is to live
And the living should not fear a gift