Self-Destruction As A Form Of Creation

Dig your fingernails into the palms of your hands to remind yourself of what it feels like to be powerful
Scratch yourself when you feel numb to remind yourself that there is still blood pumping beneath your skin
Experiment with how long you can thrive off of nothing but caffeine and nicotine
Stay awake all night staring at your bedroom window until light creeps in and the morning birds start to sing
Read old letters you’ve kept in boxes in your closet and let their words seep into your subconscious 
Burn your old journals and pretend that none of it was real
Paint over your canvases and make something new
Hurt yourself on purpose as a source of inspiration
Lock yourself inside of an empty room with no windows or mirrors
Apologize to yourself 
Ask for forgiveness
Beg to be reborn

I Am Not Coming Up For Air

I am tearing every flower out from inside of myself

and replacing them with thorns.

I am feeling this fully, painfully, everything is heavy.

I am diving into the needles of this memory

and I am not coming up for air

until I have poured every drop of your name

out of my mouth.

I Had This Dream Where I Met Myself When I Was Still In The Womb. I Could Ask Or Say Anything.

There is so much bad out here. But there is also such beauty.

Do you feel safe? Hold on to that feeling. There are times out here when it seems impossible to find safety anywhere.

It’s nice and warm where you are. Out here it gets cold and it seeps into your blood and your bones and makes you feel like a plant withering beneath the frost.

Do you feel loved? You have no idea of all the ways in which your heart will be torn apart out here. There are disadvantages to loving too fully. There are disadvantages to feeling too deeply.

Do you have the strength to make yourself numb when the world is too jagged and sharp?

You will have to learn to find love from within before you search for it without.

It will take you a very long time, and you will put it down and walk away and misplace it sometimes.

But one day you will open your eyes and you will see light everywhere. Things were dark for so long but now there is light and there is love,

oh, my god, there is love

and there is so much to be grateful for.

I love you.

Do you love me?

Rest easy. 

Sweet dreams.

Tear Out / Crumple Up / Walk Away / Escape

tear out from inside all things sharp


tear out from inside all things that cut


tear out from inside all things that bruise


tear out from inside all things that hurt


tear out from inside all things cold


tear out from inside all things cruel


tear out from inside all things heavy


tear out from inside all things empty


tear out from inside all things buried

crumple it up


throw it down on the floor


walk away


don’t look back


escape

When You Carry Your Depression Everywhere You Go

There is something dark lurking inside of me.
It has always been there,
waiting
to sink its claws 
into anything 
and everyone
that gets too close.

There is something dark lurking inside of me.
I have felt it moving in my blood
since I was very young;
even when the world was at its brightest,
I could see the clouds moving in
to cover everything in fog.

There is something dark lurking inside of me.
I tell myself I know its tricks,
I tell myself I’ve carried it long enough by now
to keep it contained,
to keep any of it from spilling out
around me
and the ones I love.

There is something dark lurking inside of me.
Some nights I lose sleep
thinking of when and how
it will resurface,
what will happen
when all of my demons
come up for air.

Great Big Nothing

I lie awake some nights
I try to achieve some form of stillness
I listen so hard I swear I can hear the earth breathing
I wait for any answers
I wait for any sign of hope
I wait for some distant echo from a past or future self

What I hear is the wind at my window
What I hear is a great big nothing
What I hear is my own voice whispering something like a prayer

It’s okay
You’re okay
You can sleep.

I Never Want To Forget Any Of This

Remember how the night was deceptively warm, and how you carried all the frost in your chest like you hadn’t spoken a word in a whole year
Remember how you drove to their house with a hurricane in your blood thinking of everything that could go wrong
Remember how you felt your knees crumble and your lungs lock up that summer night in the park behind the school
Remember how badly this ended before
Remember all the cruel hands you let touch your skin when you were grasping at anything that made you feel less alone
Remember the vulnerability
Remember the panic
Remember the feeling of an anvil on your chest
Remember the jubilance
Remember the nights when your bodies entwined on a bed made too small for two people to share
Remember the way their eyes lit up when they told you about all their favorite things
Remember how they cracked open their ribs and poured out everything collected inside
Remember how you wanted to drink their light like it was wine
Remember how you wanted to open their skull and swim inside
Remember how you would bottle sunlight for this person if you could
Remember how you you would swallow all their pain and carry all their fear if you were strong enough
Remember how you were too excited by their existence to fall asleep some nights
Remember how you fell in love like having the wind knocked out of you in the very best way
Remember all of this, every bit