When everyone has abandoned me,
my shadow laid there next to me,
and it whispered “let’s go home”

And when my poems
turned into suicide notes,
I sharpened the knife,
and put it on my pillow
to sing me to sleep

A bottle of pills with
my full name on it
White and motherly,
I heard them call my
name from a distance

I swallowed the pills,
I swallowed the knife,
my shadow swallowed me

I am finally home

1.
The seasons changed,
but he kept wearing a sweater
during the steamiest weather

He spoke in three languages,
but has only felt the word:
Melancholy,
and the joyous absence of it

He wondered who he would
be without his sweater,
and the word Melancholy

2.
He never uttered the word father
for it was heavy on his tongue
like heavy rain on a bleak midnight

His mother loved him dearly,
or ruined him and called it love

A man has fallen in love with him,
and he felt for the first time; the
warmth of equally returned love

His lover tore apart his heart, and
told him it was the final act of love

3.
After eleven years of insomnia,
he stopped measuring happiness
based on how many nights he slept
A funeral rose in his heart as he wept

He muttered the word:
Suffering
as if it were
a prayer
or a lullaby

4.
Drawing road maps on his skin
was his only consolation,
he chose the color red
to find his missing path

Scars between his thighs
like hidden treasures—
Centuries deep
away from people’s sight

5.
His new beloved was in
the shape of a knife,
they embraced and
the gushing blood
was his final act of love

Mother gave
me a blade

Mine was pink,
hers was purple

It was a useless sharp thing
that’s always in my drawer

One night,
I reached for the blade,
and it felt like my
mother’s embrace  

Every time I used it,
I was being released
from all my pains

Thank you, mother

for anyone struggling with self-image

She has a comely form
and a smile that brightens her dorm . . .
but she’s grossly unthin
when seen from within;
soon an entire campus will mourn.

Yet she’d never once criticize
a friend for the size of her thighs.
Do unto others:
sisters and brothers?
Yes, but also ourselves, likewise.

My lovely wife Beth has struggled with an eating disorder for many years. I wrote her a poem titled "Is the Mirror Unkind" soon after meeting her. She was always much lovelier in my eyes than the reflection she saw in the mirror. And she was always much more generous with other people than she was with herself. The flip side of the golden rule is that we should treat ourselves as well as we would have others treat us! I hope anyone struggling with "self reflection" problems will be as generous to themselves as they are to others. And anyone who can sympathize with Beth can sympathize with themselves (hint, hint).

Keywords/Tags: Self Image, Mirror, Anorexia, Anorexic, Eating Disorder, Inferiority Complex, Low Self Esteem, Self Worth, Self Harm, Cutting, Anxiety, Depression, Hopelessness, Suicide

these are the days of doom
u seldom leave ur room
u live in perpetual gloom

yet also the days of hope
how to cope?
u pray and u *****

toward self illumination ...
becoming an angel
(pure love)

and yet You must love Your Self

In my experience many poets, especially younger poets, are loving, caring human beings who struggle with feelings of low self esteem and low self worth. Some of them engage in self harm, such as cutting. But they would never be so negatively judgmental of others, or do others deliberate harm. This poem is for them, in the hope they will come to value themselves as much as they do their loved ones and friends.

Keywords/Tags: Angel, Angels, Human Angel, self, self discovery, self help, self worth, low self esteem, self harm, depression, hopeless, hopelessness, agoraphobia, doom, gloom, cloud, dark cloud, hope, recovery, cope, coping, illumination, enlightenment, ascension, love, pure love, true love, self love, angelic, heaven, heavenly

1998, I came to the world
A sweet little girl
That later would be the opposite
But I was still so talented
Playing guitar and piano
Like my father did
I was holding his hand
Until I was 9 and moved to another land

My dreams and hopes were left behind
I couldn’t see a future
I was totally blind
And I began to grow and cry often
And when I turned thirteen
I was so lost
My skin couldn’t no more stay clean
Bleeding like a horror movie in the screen

I started running away
I had no more reasons to stay
I was only there to cause problems
My nights became days
And my nights became helpless

I know it sounds selfish
But I just didn’t have
I didn’t have any reason to keep fighting
And I’m the same self-destructive behavior
I kept spinning

When I was 18, I moved to my father’s house
I couldn’t even handle my own thoughts
My memories from I was 14 were little dots
I was living stuck with my voices
Hurting myself
And being enable to make my own choices

I only wish I could have made my family proud
But I couldn’t stand in my own feet
When I was already nineteen
A simple task I couldn’t complete
I wish I had made you happy
But I will always need help when myself
I have to defeat

I should have been doing better now
Get over my mom
And make my daddy proud
And I hope someday I will
Somehow

There is such
loneliness in
my heart, and
it consumes me
each deathly night

Weeping I laid
and waited for
the tears to dry,
but they remained
on my face like
a wound that
won’t seem to heal