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"I collected razor blades, I bought a swiss army knife, I became fascinated with the different kinds of sharp edges and the different shapes - squares, triangles, pentagons, even an awkwardly carved heart with a stab wound at it's centre wanting to see if it hurt the way a real broken heart could hurt. I was amazed and pleased to find it didn't"

extract from Prozac Nation by Elizabeth Wurtzel

Poems

This is a small collection of my words moulded into poetry. Identifying my emotions by putting pen to paper acts as a kind of therapy that I am completely in control of. I don't have to trust anyone with my deepest secrets as I transfer them into the written word.

All poems are copyright

Graffiti

When I was younger

I used to score little lines into my school desk

and dye the scatches with felt tip pen,

cover them over with my text book

so that the teacher wouldn't accuse me of vandalism.

When I was older

I used to score little lines into my left arm

and dye the scratches with bleeding blood,

cover them over with long sleeves

so that society wouldn't

accuse me of madness.

Keep off the grass

The sun was beaming it's false grin all over me

as I sat free from the room

my open wounds were usually confined to

for an hour each week.

Therapy in the open air for the clouds to hear.

I tried to listen to the encouraging wisdom

as I clasped my fists around clumps of grass,

tearing at the turf as the words tore at my mind.

Saving my life is not worth all of this, not anymore.

Look at the thousands of blades of grass

rooted into the soil, each one perfect

until it's trodden on by life's heavy foot.

Healing hurts

The blood and flames banished,

no longer the anaesthesia for the mind,

now avoiding the self developed sixth sense

of physical pains soothing ability

of punishing the outside so the inside will survive,

without this the tension intensifies.

Denying the need hurts deeper than ever felt before,

deeper than the blood and flames could ever go,

so deep to even drown in the harrowing sorrow.

No longer injecting the paralysing narcotic

that numbed gorged wounds.

Torretial tears cascade with the resistance to bleed or burn,

unable to strike the match to ignite the relief

or dagger the blade into the soul to cut away the angst.

Admissable to society now, but if this is really healing

then how is it that the hurt is still impaled into the heart like a rusting nail.

!st March 2001

Private celebration

Well, so long year. I've reached your end,

never imagined that I'd breathe this day

without a few destructive marks -

and I promise there have been none.

I'm hovering at your end, shy

but ready to befriend a new beginning.

Not sure what will happen when I leave you behind

as I have focused on your end

with such determined vision.

I wonder if my resolve will collapse

under the pressure of another unwounded year

or will I conquer temptation once again

until I reach a second or third beginning.

Who knows, I may even

stop counting the days and months

I live without letting the wounds

push through my skin to the outside,

and I'll find myself years ahead

thinking of the damage as an interval

instead of a consumption of my life.

This maybe hoping for too much, but

perhaps the next year and the ones that follow after

will be blind to all things red and

will not dwell on the touch of a sharp edge.

• Excellent site for poetry by survivors is: www.gentletouchsweb.com/

My poem pages will be added to and poems will be changed regularly

Keep Hoping

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