One day I will not be 16

Paint Me Like a Flower | Isabella Deutsch | Acrylic paint

 One day I will not be 16  by Flair Doherty

One day I will not be 16

Scrabbling for attention 

Rabid for the smallest

Droplets of love

That I refuse to drink

Ragged and blue fingernails

Scoring deep gouges into kindred souls

Just trying to give me what I beg for

One day I will not be 16

I will not smile at the desperate noises

My stomach makes

As I mold my body into endless contortions

withholding what it needs

Skin stretching over outcroppings of bone

Battered by endless waves of loathing

Striking so suddenly I double over

Breath stripped from my lungs

By the ocean’s depths

One day I will not be 16

Shoving myself into ever smaller definitions

Of who I can be

Until I feel rough walls holding me in

Scraping my skin red 

Pressing into my sides

Sanding my mind down

Sharp elbows sandwiched to ribs

Slowly eroding myself 

One day I will not be 16

Anchored by a flickering hope

Insisting that it must get better with time

Fighting the constant urge

To stick my head in the sand

And scream

When I am not 16

Tides will rise and fall around me

Misting gently into a soft glow

Borne aloft by experience

Yet I sink deep within myself

I open my eyes and see

Beauty