I'm Trying

I’m trying, I swear

It may not look like it with my

crystallized tears on my face and

my paper heart tearing itself into shreds

that are forever getting smaller,

but I’m trying, I swear

I promise that I didn’t choose this

If it was up to me, I’d be

sunbathing and running and laughing like everyone else, not

sleeping my youth away and replaying sad songs that I don’t know how to

do away with.

The truth is, this thing,

this sickness,

it snakes its way into your body, maybe

through your nostrils like your mother’s sweet perfume, down your

throat like hot chicken noodle soup, into your heart

like the boy with the glasses who told you

you were pretty

And then once it’s there, once you’re both

comfortable and happily married together,

it won’t. get. out.

The sadness slinks past your heart, into

your soul. And once it’s reached that part

of you, you’re a goner. Because there comes a point

when you forget who you were without your sadness, so it is

comfortable and familiar, and you never want to leave.

It is the abusive lover who “loves” you maybe just a little too much,

too hard,

too fiercely.

So I promise, I swear to you, I am trying

to wipe out this darkness that’s decided

to make a home inside of me, but it is

an army of termites, and I am the habitable

wood, softened from the tsunami of tears I’ve endured,

being eaten alive piece by piece.