these models in magazines and billboards
set unrealistic expectations for young girls
thinking they need to starve themselves
just to get the flat stomach
and hourglass figure
envying every girl they see
who they view as prettier than them
going to such extremes to fit the rapidly
changing beauty standards
leaving their youthful bodies behind
to go under the knife
and inject their face with fillers
just to be called beautiful
to feel beautiful
but then the standards change
and they don't feel beautiful anymore
they do more procedures
and exercise until they drop
until the standards are to be natural
and it feels like it was all for nothing
that they'll never be enough

i feel like i'm chasing a body
that i'll never reach
every time i feel like it's in my grasp
it slips through my fingers
hunger pangs is my new normal
skipping meals and snacks
filling up on water
as not to gain weight
losing weight is all i can think about
i never have seemed to love my body
always thinking about how i look
i compare myself to everyone
and i never achieve what they seem
to have so easily
once i lose weight
it always comes back
i can't keep it off
you can tell me thousands of times
that i'm not fat or that i look nice
but your compliments will fall on deaf ears
my body has felt big since a little kid
even when i was malnourished
i saw obesity
i'll never love myself

It's Wednesday.
A flicker of nerves runs through me.
What will it say today?
The machine that holds half my worth.

I worked out four times last week.

But you skipped a day—two weeks ago.

I've been eating 1200 calories.

Have you?
What about the late-night snacks at 10 PM?
What about the weekends?

The scale will see.
It won’t lie.

I get on, and immediately, I hate myself.
A 2.5-pound weight gain in 14 days
I want to starve
I want slit my wrists
See if it teaches me a lesson:
Eat less,
Work harder,
Harder,
HARDER

The scale mocks me.
I hate it so much,
But I can’t stop.
It’s an addiction.
Tell me—
What will you show me in seven days?
Will I finally be enough then?

i watch birds fly every day
i watch cars drive every day
i watch planes soar through the sky every day

i watch people falling through the ground every day
a few times a week i see children morph into nightmares
a few times a month i see my friends walk through walls
every so often i can smell a church burning down somewhere

every once in a while everything goes quiet
all the colors around me shift either 4 shades darker or 2 shades lighter
lighter
i want to be lighter
i want to be able to lift off the ground just like the birds

i want to be so light that i can slither through molecules
as thin as a paper

i want to walk through walls
i want to morph into something scarier than my nightmares
i want to remember what it feels like to not be scared of falling through the floor

i want to burn down a church

and then cry and beg for forgiveness at the feet of the lord

i had to, i'm sorry.
it was the only way to feel like he's truly gone.

i want to be high on the feeling of screaming at the top of my lungs.
but i can't find anything that raises me up enough to feel that.
diphenhydramine morphs children into nightmares.
dextromethorphan makes people fall through the ground and walk through walls
the devil himself makes me remember the smell of a
church
        burning
                 down
but i've never seen a church burn down

perhaps it's just my mind manifesting my thoughts into physical sensations

A man I once loved told me he wished I “cared more about my body”
But I do care
I care for every lump and curve as much as I hate them
As much as he hated them

I remember yearning for puberty
A thing to make me tall
And thin
A biological fix for my
PROBLEMATIC BODY

Does he know the history?
The gain and loss
The bullies
The pushed-into-puddles
The nightmares

I despise the power of his lips
A lover disfigured
That’s the vibe
His words birthing a mantra of shame
And I’ll never outrun this skin

Thirty years later
And he’s pushing me into a lake
No principal to save me this time
No dry clothes

He left me years ago
Found a much thinner replacement for my side of the bed
It’s for the best
I tell myself as I drunkenly throw rocks at his window

“Don’t think
Just eat”
Is this just a game I play?
Three glasses of whiskey and a Postmate
Won’t chase the horror away

Momentary pleasure
(add guacamole)
Is that enough?
Will I ever be enough?

No
I am too much
Too much skin
Too much softness
Too many folds
Too much of me is filling up space
That’s what they tell me
I see the reflection and I hate all of this excess ME

“I wish you cared more about your body”

What is the remedy?
A perfect diet
A perfect exercise regimen
Pills
Sweat
Porcelain

Think before you speak on a body, sir
Because your words alone
Have the power to ignite a hell
Of
The
Utmost
Destruction

His venom is still pulsing through me
And I’m burning up
I want to escape
Crawl out from the water
Become pure wind

But how do I love me?
How do I allow myself to occupy space?
To stop hiding from every mirror, every glance at the ocean of my belly?

I don’t know
I’m not there yet
I am on an opposite shore consumed by self-hatred
Longing to set sail for somewhere

Somewhere I can cherish the secrets that these sacred ripples of flesh hide
Where my waistline is a treasure map of my wisdom
A place where his words have no power
Where I collapse into the sunset and set myself...
F
R
E
E

sitting in my car
crying on my birthday
trying to drive on
swerving through the turn lane

another year, another fear
I'm anxious as I steer
then my eyes well with tears and I can't see the road
crashed my car let me go home
I don't want to be here anymore

people stare but they aren't looking
it's my ******* birthday
trying to drive on
swerving off the road and I'm gone

another year another fear
I wish for death as I steer
crashed my car let me go home
I wanna die on the day that I was born