mustbewriting13

I can only hold on so long, like slips of paper in your hand. I am not chained down to you or this life; I am freedom. I'll never grow the wings of a bird or butterfly, or be above this world like clouds in the sky, but I am not sedentary. I am not a tree, but I am grounded. I'll stay until I uproot or am uprooted, taking with me the seasons and their grace, the apple blossoms behind my ears, and my withered arms from too harsh a winter. I am imagination and spirit, I am essence. I am beyond this world in eyes and heart, in the scars and hairs that cover my body; I am the remains of humanity, where humanity itself lies within my ashes.

The demons never say goodnight; they never wait until morning. They're waiting in the shadows, trolls under the bridge, monsters in the closet, nightmares worse than our most sweat-drenching dreams. ...I can never go to sleep.

My body is my only canvas, but my tools lack the love and bristles of a painter's brush. I am a masterpiece, an abstract of scars and freckled skin. I draw lines of blood along my arms, carve words into my thighs. I tell a story in broken lines because my voice and hands waiver. The picture I paint isn't pretty; it's coated in tears and shedded make-up, veins forever pumping blood down my cheeks. But the tale it tells is beyond skin deep, down to heart and lungs and moving limbs, the way we walk and the way we sing, how we love and are loved, despite titles and the color of our skin, the meals we've skipped or how many times we've made ours

You are simplicity, a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt. Your eyes are the color of slate slicked with rain, mine to hold in my gaze, trying to find the tiny brown spot you say I never see. You are long hikes in the summer and car rides in the winter, hand in hand down old dirt roads. You are heavy metal songs louder than the beating of our hearts late at night, drowning out the truths that scream obscenities in our ears. You are uncertainty, an awkward hand that adjusts to hold mine, lanky fingers, calloused and agile beyond your twenty years. Your tongue lacks my linguistic quickness, but I'll never have your gull or guts to attempt the i

We are bent, but not broken. Our bodies are old tree stumps cut down long ago, but our hearts and minds will stretch like branches, reach towards the stars that we'll wear like late cherry blossoms. We are dried and withered from years of harsh words against our skin, and battered fists into our guts. But, you and I, will join together our hands and intertwine our fingers into limbs a hundred strong. We will stand taller than they, upon hills and mountain tops, higher than the clouds that once blocked our eyes. We are the underdogs, while they sit among their riches and animosity. But we are the ones who will change this world, dig up the so

Cigarette between your lips, smoke around your face, you are an angel. You cloud your eyes with depth and drink, and coat your lips with ash, stale-piss breath in your lungs. You are not bad, but the goodness inside of you is the size of an ember from your last cigarette. You are tar and toxins, hidden beneath the sickly sweet tang of nicotine. You were intoxication, a drink I abused because I couldn't forget the taste. You are a drug inside my body, flowing through my blood stream, poisoning my veins. You were never good for me, but I enjoyed the sickness, the sweat, the illusion that I was a light you wouldn't burn out.

F-A-T; the word stands out bold in my brain. Down another cupcake, another cup of Coke, not thinking of the sugary morsels that run past my lips until another pound is added on the scale. I'm triple digits; too big, too flabby, not small enough for a size two dress. I put a finger down my throat, but nothing comes out into the foamy toilet water below me. I count each calorie and gram of saturated fat, but I always fail, always binge until I want to die. Swim another lap, run another mile, grind bone against bone with every strain of my muscle. They say that I am healthy, but healthy is never thin.

I promise to be your sweetheart, to smile for you and not tear up my skin. I'll sit on your lap when you're drunk, and I'll hold your hand when you're not. I'll kiss your lips, your cheeks, your neck, because you deserve to be treasured. I'll turn away when you smoke your special cigarettes, but secretly inhale their scent when you hold me close. I'll learn your favorite song by Dream Theater, know the words by heart like I know the letters of your name. I want to be your sunshine, your everything. I want to be the one who wakes up to your green eyes every morning, bright like precious emeralds in the early light.

The patch of bare skin below your neck fascinates me, smooth and pale beneath a mint-colored shirt, carelessly left unbuttoned at the top of your breast. I shy away from your adolescent figure, small and child-like in a young man's arm, but a woman in mine. I'm not meant to crave your long hair and gloss-painted lips, but the freckles on your cheeks mock me, your hips intoxicate me. I only imagine your scent, your taste, sweet and gentle like the air inside me, girl's perfume and shampoo clung to you like a veil. You're nothing but a little girl, but, in my arms, you could be so much more.

You're only a glimmer, a touch of the skin, a slight of the hand. Your eyes are only mirrors, and your hands a woodland breeze, a dream I've tried to remember. Your breath is the smoke in my lungs, a fire burning beneath the surface of my groin, the sweet grainy earth from your lips to mine. But if I reach out to your cheek, you'll turn to sand between my fingers, blowing away with the breath of a broken kiss. Yet I will still hear you, I will still feel you against my breast. But still, you are only a dream, transparent as the moon and as distant as the stars.