archimedes-arrow

[archimedes-arrow]

i know that there is something sick inside me.

i can feel it tangled up in my intestines. i can feel it wherever it goes.

low in my belly or high up in my ribcage, higher even, at the base of my throat, creeping its fingers along my jugular.

it weaves itself around my organs maliciously. sometimes it grabs on to parts of me and squeezes with all its might, just for the hell of it i’m sure.

does the sickness hate me because everything is so ugly in there?

i don’t know what my insides look like but i do know they aren’t pretty. my fallopian tubes. my stomach. my esophagus. my soul. so much ugliness. so much hate.

i let my teeth fall out because i don’t want to bite anymore, i don’t want to chew. i don’t want to feed the sickness, i don’t want to feed myself.

neither of us deserve it.

[archimedes-arrow]

[archimedes-arrow]

I’m gonna be fucking sick. Am I gonna be fucking sick for the rest of my life? Give me an answer or kill me

[archimedes-arrow]

Will I die from this fucking perpetual belly ache

[archimedes-arrow]

Katherine Mansfield, from a diary entry featured in “The Diaries of Katherine Mansfield,”

[archimedes-arrow]

I feel so wronged. I don’t know if that is a selfish assumption or if I really have been left behind.

One day I will die and worms will eat all the disgusting rotting fat off my body and I will be a pile of bones and that will be my justice.

I’m sorry I’m so angry.

N

[archimedes-arrow]

Dearest everything,

I could eat up the whole world raw and scrape the top of my mouth to shreds in the process and still I would be hungry.

I love you,

N

[archimedes-arrow]

Hello?

I can feel the food caught in between my teeth, the gooey clumps of mascara stuck to my eyelashes, thin layers of dry skin flaking on the sides of my nose.

Hello?

I pick at invisible acne on my face, my neck, my shoulders, my arms, chest, stomach, thighskneescalves. My body is covered in potmarks and little scabs from clawing away nonexistent blemishes. I will excavate the imperfect surface of my flesh until it is so smooth that even my greatest fears cannot stick to it.

Hello?

I rip the tiny invisible baby hairs from my chin and above my lips. I run a shaving razor over my forearms and the backs of my hands until they bleed.

Do you ever hear me?

I’ve knawed my cuticles half an inch up every finger. My canines have dug into the first two knuckles of my right hand so many times that they are now constantly bleeding callouses. Here’s something you don’t learn from watching hours of gorgeousperfectbeautiful girls doing their makeup: if you vomit violenty enough you will see the lovliest shade of pinkish-red mixed in with the other contents of your stomach. You will shit the rest of the blood out the next day and when you do it will be black. It will look like your insides are made of tar.

Please hear me.

I obsess over my own hideousness. I look in mirrors and think only that if I smashed the glass right then I could probably find a shard big enough to cut the excess fat from my hips, my belly, the insides of my thighs, the backs of my upper arms.

No, wait. Please listen.

I lay in scalding baths and feel my stretch marks growing, encasing my body in mortifying tattoos I can never rid myself of. I sleep on my side and imagine the wrinkles I must be making. I’ve created my own torture and learned my own helplessness.

Hello? Please don’t go, please just listen, please understand, please pity me, please see my fear, please tell me you’re horrified at what I’ve done to myself.

In the noble and endless pursuit of beauty I’ve rendered myself despicable and unlovable.

Please tell me you love that.

Please tell me I’m pretty.

-N

[archimedes-arrow]

My tummy hurts, my feet hurt, even my lips.

My heart, too.

-N

[archimedes-arrow]

If you are listening,

I don’t want to go backwards, but oh G-d I don’t want to go on.

Where should I end?

N

[archimedes-arrow]

To whom it may concern,

I can feel everyone around me all the time. I can feel their eyes and their judgement and their presense. I feel the need to cover my neck with my hands, like an old instinct to protect my jugular, like if I give them the opportunity they will tear out my throat. What threat do they actually pose? There will always be a reason to hide, won’t there?

Sincerely,

N

[archimedes-arrow]

To whom it may concern,

Where did I go?

Sincerely,

N