I noticed you

Swaying as you walked,

Your legs

As long as a highway

Swishing your skirt.

I wont objectify you

By whistling through my teeth

Because they're false

Like your boobs

And may fall out

Like your boobs

Tumbling out of you skirt's open top.

Have I mentioned your boobs

Too many times?

I should turn and look away, watch where I'm going...

Too late

As I turn

The lamp post meets my head

Just above my eye brow.

Blood gushes and girls giggle

Having watched my misfortune

And the reason for it.

Clutching my head I walk on

To the bar for a blind date.

Surprised to find it's you!

With your legs and your skirt and...

You send me away

Covered in blood.

And I dine alone.

Though, it depends upon which

part, which section your lips

choose to caress first,

we dare not show the

entirety of ourselves at

once, we are a constantly

contradicting entity

Of the arms that hold

it is a sweeter taste,

one that exudes the

familial love between

blood and bond.

Of the legs it holds

a firmer, stout flavor

humming of the bark

that sheds from the

All-Mother's trees,

it is our love for this

world and beyond.

Of our head is a

sharp taste, akin to

our ability to think

and dream, we must

always be grateful for

our wit.

Though, that is not all

there is to a human soul,

each individual has its own

variation, a promise that

each of us are unique

and worthy of

existence.

He slithered into my soul,

Swallowing me whole...

Slowly digesting me,

For years...

Written by Michele Del Russi

They dream

on concrete and cobblestones.

In cold, wet gutters.

With eyes and faces turned skyward.

The reprieve of sleep never coming.

And there’s you,

above them.

Walking on air.

Playing

in stars.

And you smile and you wave,

but never does your hand extend.

Never do you lift them.

They are down there dreaming

with their eyes wide open, yearning.

And you are up high, living with eyes closed.

So you cover them, blindfolded.

If you do not look, then you do not see.

And sometimes, you hear their pleas calling up to you.

But you could never reach your hands that far.

Just tell them keep their heads down.

Their time will come.

And they forget.

They leave you to your pedestal

amidst the burning constellations they yearn for.

But tread lightly—

Don’t let them know that that ceiling is glass.

Your castle, fragile and volatile.

Don’t let them know.

Because if they heard your footsteps

in the stars they shoot for over-head,

they might wake from their dreams.

And if the beast woke,

that ceiling

might break.

Splintered shards of bloodied light, tumbling.

Til it falls in their gutters,

with you in their midst.

Til we’re all on one level

and you crawl

with the insects and rats.

Sometimes I think I miss you

Then I realize you aren’t that person anymore

Sometimes I think I miss you

Then I realize I miss what we used to have

Sometimes I think I miss you

Then I realize you weren’t who you said you were

Sometimes I think I love you

Then I realize I love the idea of you

Sometimes I think I love you

Then I realize I love the way you used to make me feel

Sometimes I reminiscne

About the special thing we used to have

Sometimes I reminisce

About what could’ve been

The saddest part is

I gave you everything

And my head was filled with your empty promises

I gave you my all

And you let me think you did the same

I gave you my loyalty

And you let me think I had yours

But instead

You gave her your all

You gave her your loyalty

You gave her your love

And I was left there

Left wondering why

Why I wasted my time loving you

When you loved another

I’ve been Icarus for so long

hands burning

in the sun

with

afterflashes of your

cheeks &

watered-down honey

spilling

from your lips.

There is no rest-stop

in the clouds,

though I try to

lie down there.

They watch me

fall,

condensed brows

furrowed. Curiousity

at the strange human thing

with wings

of myths

dripping

in the sun.

We try to teach butterflies

to crash-land & not

shatter

like delicate insect things.

there is powder

all over my face/

the detritus

of collision.

They do not melt like me,

they tear

like paper

& I wear

their epitaphs

fleetingly.

You and I, a lone island in an ocean of throbbing. My wallowing edges meeting your rough, yearning dunes. Me, the lush fronds decaying in your drought-ridden heat. My soft, lacy edges, crisp and scabbed. With ocean waves constantly teasing. Saltwater-sickness, pressing against us in tempting tides of false relief. Our palates and bellies, unfamiliar with the reprieve granted by a sated second. Constant discontent. Constantly aching, constant. You and I, weathering the oceanic destruction and the withering heat to rebuild and rebuild and rebuild again.

I remember our skin pressed together hot at seventeen. I remember long nights in your basement room. Lazy days in my bed behind a locked door. I remember the sun bringing your freckles out to play and toasting my skin to your favorite shade of me. I remember your fingers creeping inside of me playful on train rides to the city. Your mouth sleepy on my own and your arms pulling me into the cradle of dreams. And I remember waking from the dream in a desperate fever. Dead phone lines. Unanswered letters. Lonely sheets. And bruised love thrown to its knees. The floor its only brace. The snow drifting in as summer disappeared.

This piece was written about my experience living with Dissociative Identity Disorder.

“Pick one,”

the world tells me,

lacking any true understanding

of the choices I have

or that it is snatching those from me

by uttering such a command,

fiercely shoving this square peg into its pre-approved round hole.

“Pick one,”

the world tells me,

because people like me-

who really are we-

are: “odd”

misunderstood,

“frightening” to the blissfully ignorant.

"Pick one,"

they say,

because having thirty-something names (and counting)

is far too large a burden to them;

I better keep myselves to myself,

push through alone,

lest I bring shame,

lose relationships.

However

“Embrace all,”

I say,

because all of these parts

are parts of me-

parts that I need,

parts whose concerns I heed,

parts whose loss I would greatly grieve.

“Embrace all,”

I say,

because people like me-

who really are we-

are: courageous,

resilient,

fearfully strong,

(in part) because of

the choices available,

the uniquely beautiful structure and functioning of each of our minds.

And, so,

I pick all,

not one,

forgetting “the world”,

because my first duty is to me…

all of me.

#poetry #personal #emotional #memoir #experience #life #acceptance #perspective #survivor #trauma #abuse #ptsd

I FEEL THE GHOST OF EVERY HAND THAT WAS EVER SWATTED AWAY.

I FEEL EVERY FINGER

THAT CRAWLED INSIDE ME

FEIGNING MISUNDERSTANDING.

I FEEL MYSELF FULL WITH WHAT I DID NOT ASK FOR.

FULL WITH DISAGREEMENT,

POURING OUT MY BLOODIED, RAW THROAT.

FULL WITH THE WORDS PINNING ME DOWN.

AND FULL WITH FIRE AT THE REALIZATION THAT THERE WAS TRUTH NAUGHT BEHIND THE WORDS.

FULL WITH FIRE, BRIMMING OVER.

FULL WITH FIRE, POOLING BETWEEN MY LEGS.

FLAMES LICKING MY THIGHS.

LASHING IN HOT BREATHS

AT EACH HAND THAT DARES

AFTER BEING SWATTED.

WHIPPING AND SCORCHING

THE CREEPING FINGER TIPS.

ENVELOPING ME FULL.

AND BURNING THE WORDS AWAY INTO CHARRED RUINS.

AND THE GHOSTS DO NOT LEAVE.

I CARRY THEM WITH ME.

BUT I NO LONGER CARRY THE BLAME.

THAT

BELONGS TO YOU.

AND YOU SPARKED AN INFERNO WHEN YOU TRIED TO PLACE IT INSIDE OF ME.

WELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE BONFIRE.

TONIGHT

FOR ONCE,

WE WILL BURN

you

AT THE STAKE.