I should have been
a bloody mangled mess
they tell me
it’s impossible
when they learn
what I survived
as a kid
taught to submit
groomed to please
they circumcised
my anger
forcefully
left my rage
unscabbed blindly

wounds are the colors
of moods we respond with
I became a watercolor
maelstrom
of mental illness
unseeing
in the maze
of so many mistakes
winding down into the gut
like alleyways
uncounted wrong turns
not seeing

how I let other
external things fill me
with secrets
and toxic self-loathing
my body holding on
to everything
burning both ends
feeling on empty
even when full
unable to relax
unable to forgive
unable to stop
punishing

so I started a habit
of noticing where the pain
would skulk off to
when I felt it
of my unspoken ideas
buried themselves deep
choking on resisting
remembering
the feeling
of my throat
forced open
like drowning
but being pierced
against my will
the chill of my own fury
denuded my ego
exposed for me to see
the pain of eating
became the short circuit
in the shame I felt
for needing
and even accepting
this was what
I was worth
but no more
now I roar

there’s a strange
albeit comforting
irony
that people like
to be around me
with everything I’ve seen
I’ve walked with monsters
within and without
maybe some part of me
became monstrous
when I accepted it
but the fear went away
even knowing it
always was meant to end

in the process
I lost all these pieces
of myself
and when there was nothing
left
I saw
how many of the pieces
I thought were me
were always just ideas
identified and conceived
as far more solid
than they ever could be
I failed to see
what the true nature
of my condition
really was

then the conditions
come apart
entropy rules
to give you a real good view
into how you were
so mistaken
to think you were the center
of anything
but your own story
and that like everyone else
you only seem to learn
through
all that’s been taken
away piece by piece

sometimes
this constant birthing
this angst of becoming
that doesn’t stop
a tsunami of evolution
in your crossing
through time
it’s such a painful process
you want to scream
at the loss you feel
as so complete
overwhelming
your sensitivity
to such a degree
the idea is experienced
in a peak moment
as if it were real
a climax of being
we seek again and again

yet it’s not
glamorous
the glory is lived twice
only facing the past
while looking ahead
means being filled
with uncertainty
and that doesn’t mean
being afraid
but trusting your system
and that it’s ok to forget
too
the minute there’s relief
it’s easy to dwell too much
on how it feels
and not speak enough
to how it heals

when the pain
screamed for you
to believe
it was real
for a minute there
you thought that this was it,
the shiver ghosted
thru your mind,
didn’t it?

and yet, even knowing
this offbeat imperfection
is nothing more
than a mashed up construct
identity of things
I feel make me ME
points of view
I agreed with
people who impacted me
inspiring me
to keep striving to move
in perfect harmony

and yet, even seeing
all the pieces of me
a self-made rag-doll
of all the hearts it shapes
looking back on it
back on the glory days
the blood flowed
in and out your veins
you smile and breathe out
knowing
without doubt
that you’d do it
all over again