table of contents
I. the princess.............. 9 - 37 II. the damsel.............. 38 - 87 III. the queen.............. 88 - 128 IV. you................. 129 153 here lies the raw, unpolished, & mostly disjointed pieces of my soul. ah, life the thing that happens to us while were off somewhere else blowing on dandelions & wishing ourselves into the pages of our favorite fairy tales. once upon a time
I. the princess
the princess i was born a little bookmad. i could be found stroking the spines of my books while i sat locked alone inside my tower bedroom. all the while, i hoped my books would spill their exquisite words over the lush green carpet so i could collect them one by one & savor them like berries inside of my mouth. - forever a collector of words. when i had no friends i reached inside my beloved books & sculpted some out of 12 pt times new roman. - & it was almost good enough. the queen my mother smiled as she offered a cube of sugar in her upturned palm. greedily, i accepted. i reached inside my mouth, delicately placing one (just one) on the center of my tongue, & i clamped down. salt. that is what abuse is: knowing you are going to get salt but still hoping for sugar for nineteen years. - you may be gone, but i still have a stomachache. one night, the princess i the princess i the princess i the princess woke to feel the bed rocking back & forth back & forth back & forth back & forth back & forth back & forth back & forth back & forth back & forth at first, she thought a hurricane must be brewing - i cant. im sorry. you should never love anything more than you love your own children. you should never love anyone more than you love your own children. - how could you? where do all the memories go, the ones we hide away with lock & key yet continue to shape us all the s a m e? - did it really happen if i cant remember it? at eleven years old the doctor weighed me & afterwards, my mother told me i was too fat & that i needed to go on a diet immediately. for an entire year, food barely passed through my lips. i did not even allow myself to take a sip of water because i wanted to be so thin that i could blow away with the slightest breeze disappear. i dropped sixty pounds in a few short months & i had to wear long sleeves to cover up the cat scratches. - everybody told me how good i looked, though. friend request from _________ a) the girl who said you were ugly. b) the girl who said your voice was off-key. c) the girl who refused to defend you. d) the girl who laughed at you behind your back & to your face. e) the girl who took your lunch money every day because she said you didnt need to eat. f) the girl who said you were fat even after you starved yourself half to death. g) the girl who was supposed to be your best friend. h) all of the above. - keep pressing ignore, lovely. fat /fat/ adjective
- a descriptive word.
it has no deeper meaning. it should not determine the worth (or lack thereof) of a human being. - what i know now that i wish i knew then. sticks & stones never broke my bones, but words made me starve myself until you could see all of them. - skin & bone. my sister & i spent our nights wishing upon the plastic glow-in-the-dark stars plastered to our ceiling. - we made it after all. there was never enough alcohol to keep my mother warm in a house as cold as t h i s. - but you kept trying, didnt you? there were once six five girls who shared every part of themselves: blood & secrets & lovers & even a diary. but a girl can only bleed so much before she meets her demise. - ill see you in california. how can someone be too young to be in love when we were crafted from ocean waves & starlight? - young love . my first kiss: tackled, pinned down, a mouth repeating no no no . after: bruises & the unmistakable taste of blood. - i will never forgive you. you have been the star of each & every one of my nightmares. - you left but you stayed. im sorry i wasnt the daughter you had in mind. - i only ever wanted to make you proud. I. blood blooming underneath the stinging bite of steel. II. the once too-tight jeans hanging off my body. - two unexpected reliefs of a girl. it is strange how s i s t e r s can be s a v i o r s or s t r a n g e r s & sometimes a bit of both. - sisters . - silence has always been my loudest scream. birds cant f l y a w a y when you clip one of their wings. you werent satisfied with just clipping one of my wings. you tore both wings out from the root to make sure i could n e v e r f l y anywhere ever again. - mother & daughter. since i couldnt have my wings, i wore the fake ones dipped in gold glitter. - a wannabe faerie in converse. there came a time when poetry showed me how to bleed without the demand of blood. - my most loyal lover. i used to think i was broken because i never once spent my daydreams plucking swollen pomegranates from someone elses tree. - then i learned that society is broken, not me . watching the house that was my sanctuary & my hell go up in flames was bittersweet but mostly just sweet. - a confession. if a house does not automatically make a home, then a body doesnt automatically make a home either. - ive always felt like a stranger in my skin. you may not have left (many) bruises on my skin, but you left giant blackberry bruises all over my soul. - i still wonder who i would have been. the princess locked herself away in the highest tower, hoping a knight in shining armor would come to her rescue. - i didnt realize i could be my own knight.
II. the damsel
the damsel let the dragons swoop down & steal her away from the ugliness of her world. unbeknownst to her, she was only trading one tower for another. - the wickedest liars of all. im not scared of the monsters hidden underneath my bed. im much more scared of the boys with messy brown hair, sleepy eyes, & mouths that only know how to form half-truths. - my dragons. remember when you told me you wrote that beautiful song for me & only me your only one? well , im willing to bet you dont remember that you had already showed it to me, saying it was for her . - you were in love with the idea of love, not me. promises whispered in the rain will be washed a w a y. - right down the fucking drain. i was the one thing he had to deny the beautiful truth within his terrible lie. - who knew such a young heart could shatter? when my dragon with the green eyes left, i took a knife & cut off all my long, pretty hair, taking away the only thing he ever loved about me. - over before it began. i could just eat you up. - from the insatiable mouth of the big, bad wolf. he loves me. he loves me not. he loves her. he loves her not. he loves me. he loves me not. he loves her. he loves her not. he loves me. he loves me not. he loves her. he loves her not. he loves me. he loves me not. he loves her. he loves her not. he loves me. he loves me not. - i ran out of petals. blood runs wherever his fingertips graze me. - my steel & thorns. for a time, it seemed to me that we were starlight-touched, failing to realize that we were actually star-crossed. - the stars were never on our side. he was made of fire & i was made of ice. i came too close to his flame & he melted me with his embers, reducing me down to a puddle. with time, i froze over again, but i was never quite the same a fragile, watery imitation of what once was. - where was my fear of fire when it came to you? i hate you. - his version of i love you. when it finally came time for him to leave, he packed up all my poetry in a suitcase & took it with him. - first my heart, then my words. he promised to fix me & he left me more s h a t t e r e d than i had been before. - but now ive got gold in the cracks. i have so much love to give, but no one ever wants it. - a cup overfilled.
