Secrets spill from your lips
In hiccuped slurry speech
That night you learned the most important lessons
Teachers never teach

You're on the fence
But you always tumble in an empty bottle
Trapped on all four sides
Looking up at the light, legs weak and wobbly

And those lines you stood by
Those boundaries began to blur
All that you believed in
Every bridge you charred and burned

Did you find the answers
Laced within those pills?
This self medication will make you numb
To what you must rebuild

It began when I skipped lunch
When snacks became meals
And food became calories
I stopped standing and began to kneel
It started with pictures on blogs
Collar bones, thigh gap, dead eyes
Worshiping goddesses who never eat
Whose smoke curls as easy as their lies

It was about being weightless
Being skinny, being happy
To wither and fold into myself
"Somebody please look at me!"
Now my eyes are heavy
I have to hug the wall to get anywhere
Colorful bruises bloom on my legs
The room's spinning, black spots everywhere

I'm like Atlas, holding up my world
With shaky hands, bloods spattering everywhere
Step by step I keep moving, it's never enough
I'm killing myself over what size clothes I wear
Two years ago I wanted this
Asking Google a list of excuses not to eat
Now I think I'm dying, looking up heart arrhythmias
Because I can't follow a single beat

People always tell you that it can get better
What they neglect to tell you is how much worse it gets
Before the better part comes
In every eating disorder novel,
You can always perfectly pinpoint the moment
The protagonists steps over the line of unwell
Into well
This whole 'recovery' deal sounded good enough at first
I get to eat Luna Bars,
I have positive quotes all over the place,
I meditate and do yoga all day,
I somehow reach the a level of Enlightenment
Usually reserved for Buddhist monks
And I don't have to live with a ******* eating disorder anymore
I bought a recovery journal
To talk back to my mental illness
But so far my depression has taken control of the pen
I bought a adult coloring book
To help me de-stress
But I still only want to color a river on my wrists a crimson color

I keep thinking there's a way to be a functional bulimic
Or even better, a functional anorectic
A way that I can be recovered and enlightened and normal
And still dissect each and every meal
As if I was dealing with something ***** and impure
Is it still recovery if I can't fight the voices in my head?
Is if still recovery if I don't even try?
Is it still recovery if I still can't look in the mirror,
want the outside to mirror the chaos inside,
crave sunken cheeks and fallen out hair
That I want to preform a vanishing act right before your eyes
See my skin cave in, bones protruding
I used to think that eating disorders were about beauty
But now I realize they're about pain
And perfection and punishment
And I had to live through it to see that

I seem to never be able to do anything right
And my eating disorder was supposed to remedy that
I was good at self destruction
I was good at sitting at dinner, sipping diet coke
Feeling oh, so superior and smiling brightly
As I said that I'd already eaten
And begged my stomach pains not to betray me then
But now I've failed at having an eating disorder
And at not having an eating disorder
And I can't live anymore in this shade of gray
Coloring everything and ruling my thoughts
I don't want to be in "recovery"
I want to be recovered
Because no one tells you
How you'll cry through every single meal
How you'll see yourself grow in the mirror and not know
What's real and what's not
No one tells you
That an eating disorder never goes away
That you'll never diet again
That trying to lose weight in recovery isn't a good idea

The worst thing about an eating disorder
Is that there is no such thing as abstinence
Recovery is not one decision
It is a decision you will have to make
Every time you find yourself looking down at a plate
And at first, you'll have to pray to the gods
For indulging in the sins of being a human
But someday, maybe someday
Those prayers will go somewhere else

I swear on my grave
That this will be the last time
I write a poem about you

I swear that this
Will be my final release
Me letting your memory go
Let some other girl spend nights thinking about you

I swear to myself
That this stream on consciousness
Placed on paper will be the last time
I waste words on you

I swear to you that this
Is the end of my feelings
That that pang of sadness
That twist of the knife will go away

I swear to Gods that I don't believe in
That I will use this as an opportunity
To learn to love myself and not
Some boy who will give it all away

I swear to everyone that
I won't look through the poetry
I wrote about you, the words you stole from me
The time I wasted, stringing words together about your smile

I can swear all I like
But here I am, crying at 10:07
Writing yet another poem about you
I swear that I'm a liar

How old are we all, really?
All the years you spent playing catch up.
Running with your broken legs.
More sinister than it seems.
No patrol, no not today sir.

Dead hair in sink drains.

I forgot everything I ever learned at 14.
Fell down the rabbit hole.
Ivy clinging to houses, pulling down walls.
You're pushing up daisies, at least last time I heard.
Somewhere your mother cries and the bells begin to toll.

Blowing old dandelions out,
trying to cash my expired wishes and bring you back.

Wonder how old you were the first time you died.
I was 7.
12.
14.
After that, 16.
Ask me again tomorrow.

Drowning in bathtubs.
Falling out of nests.
Our baby bird wings weren't ready yet.

Cutting your hair at night, rainbows blooming.
Empty train stations with bricks as our luggage.
Nothing left to dream of.
Green water spilling out from beneath the potted plants.
Life is a domino effect.

I've been living in shades
since the day they buried me in robins egg blue.
All I'm really trying to tell you is babe,

I miss you.

He said:
"let's pretend you don't come in waves of blue hair and mystery."  

Lets take these shots so you can be a bad girl for me.
And I stood there toeing a half empty beer can
with my beat up boots thinking
"what the **** dude?"

He said I want to get to know you,
I want to see if what they say is true.
I look up through the smoke and the lights and the crowd
and tell you "It is".

And this excites him. "Oh yeah baby I know what you are".

"What am I? I thought was nothing but a blue haired mystery, an enigma, a presence to be desired...",
and he leans in to me, his gin soaked breath in my ear:

"You love, are a ******* temptress."

So now I have been reduced to all damsel all lust all distress.
Those stupid princes never stop to wonder
if the pretty face in the tower even wants to be rescued.

Cause babe, I never asked to be saved.

Cause maybe I have built these walls to keep men like you out.
Or maybe I just wanted to have the chance to
invite you in on my own terms.

Maybe I just wanted to be able to escort you out.
This has never been my prison, this is my tower.
My legacy.