'little bird' from that old Emily Dickinson poem, train tracks and pleas to stay
signs of a suicide outlived
signs of a Happiness: wanted
Joy: wanted
intention: good, intention: desperate
i am dying inside of this body and coming back alive and it has bothered me that this does not show.
that my skin and limbs go on, my hair grows on and my voice remains smooth and torn lips smile in robotic movement
everything has started and ended hereand left no sign you could point to
i went about that all wrong - a Manchausen crawling up to their tenth hospital that month takung pills to go unconcious all for some door somewhere that would let them in, like i was dead broke and i needed the insurance money so i burned the house down, crashed the car, created a crime scene
i wanted pain to be seen and the poetry and the drawings did not feel like enough anymore, i was only lazy for sleeping in and insincere for slipping in grades and i wanted proof i wanted the wreckage inside myself to show up in a way for all to see; only to cover it up with long sleeves
no one beleived in ghosts anymore, if you were a haunted house you were only good for stories around a campfire - entertainment and mocking and at best am exercise in pushing someone's understanding of the world, mythology, fiction, something that happened a long time ago in a place far far away.
so i got to work. i found scissor and switchblade and marked my skin and saw it swell in red blotches and felt that satisfaction i would chase down for years to come.
but there is always an after - to parties and war and disaster. aftermath a word for grass growing out of fields burned down, an idea i was so enamoured by i made a living of it - research, academia, social work - yet i couldn't possibly live out mine, right?
i look at the calendar everyday and try to make it another day after that night, another day uneventful with nothing to show for it but time passed by, meals eaten, coffee drank, more television watched. and i make a life of trying not to die, of leaving the door open for anyone to come into, even joy
of admittiting to the abyss i held in, of doing my time, of confessions and fights and pleas, and then still this
still sunlight and more time, more pages empty and waiting
it has been 26 days until i made my arms bleed and i think tattoos are not so stupid and hipster-y after all.
i would like a cat, some stars, some of the words that got me here
please remember this, i am telling my body, remember the great grey days and the soft bright yellow ones too, let them mark you, anchor you someplace good, someplace halfway home.