out of the ash box

i am more, so much more than just a plath wannabe in life
you are here, fighting for every second with my body and my being
i want them with you too but i don't think you understand me or my strife
i came out of the ash box, i came out of somewhere that left me screaming

started something trivial, now i'd be crying if my body would allow
let me for months past over anything other than a stung eye like an onion
i remember years ago, sitting by the ash, i don't really know how
but i remember the sketches and burning them in the fire that burned running

i remember the princess and how her love was tortured and then how i was scarred
i remember scoffing because what else can you do when your fairytale is the old kind
the kind that teaches you a lesson! the kind that disney had in their future but so far
i reject love because then you never hurt when you are hurt, when you are left behind

is it normal to tell your child you will leave them? is it normal to do it?
i don't remember much but i remember enough to be sad
and i remember sketching torture like i'd seen, like you'd showed me, like i knew fit
my life in the ash box when i crawled back in with my skinny short limbs, bad

i am less, so much less than you taught me i am, which is nothing
i am free, never free, because i have complex damn ptsd...well who cares
another victim is just another victim even when their martyr complex is strong
and i am here, but i don't know if i want to be, but i don't dare

i remember burning up, watching the flames lick my fingertips as i numbed myself to heat
i remember throwing the evidence of my thoughts and anything i dared be away
i remember keeping the rest in notebooks too miniature to read
i don't remember much but i sure remember hurt, even as the edges fray

oh! how dare you train me to be so afraid of being critical even to this day
even after my brain has finished developing and my body has hurt for many years
oh! how dare i be critical of you after all you have done for me, after all i have stayed
i suppose i'm awful and i should be punished for my ways and for my tears

am i a demon? no. yes. no. you used to love me, i think. i don't remember very well.
how could someone do so much damage to family, i thought
and then, ten years ago to the month, i went into the psych ward and learned their spell
they pretend to listen but their words show they never learned anything they didn't want

i'm okay but i am also never and i am also holding onto the knife's edge with my fingertips
as they bleed i continue because how else could i behave in this almost 2019 moment
i'm dying and i am feverish and i tell lies because feelings are real monsters made out of shit
hallucinations that were never there become real distressing excuses for being spent

what do you do when your brain falls apart and they threaten to take everything you want away
when do you give in when you know that you need to be sliced open soon
for your own good of course, take the teeth out, remove the rot, let the others stay
a little bit rotten and drilled and filled and buffed and obviously not a boon

that is me, i am my own teeth, and every cell in my body! they fight, except when they don't
i wonder often if that is your fault, it would help if i had my memories
so i cling to the ones i have: in the ash box again, burning paper just to stay warm, i can't
holding fingers to moments to see if i turn to ash too, of this i will never be free