Rise Up, Oh Heart, For There is Another Battle to Win

"The problem is, there’s no putting childhood back in a body thats outgrown it. There’s no room."

"

sext: people died for you.
I bet you liked it.

sext: they say Helen’s was the face
that launched a thousand ships
but she’s got nothing on you.

sext: good men took up arms and you
torched a city to the ground.

sext: But, oh, the roar of victory.
You must have been so proud.

"

"

Dear 15
When the car breaks down (again), you will reach deep into your pockets and offer up all of your measly life’s savings to fix it. Your mother will shake her head and you will not understand it. There is a lot you don’t understand, yet. And sometimes love comes in the shape of a “no” you are not equipped to accept. But 15 isn’t nearly so grown up at you think it is and the future is toddering toward you on shaky legs and it’s okay to be afraid of it. You don’t know who you are right now, but here are a couple hints: red meat makes your stomach hurt, pink is not the enemy, and girls are really, really pretty. And it’s okay if you want to kiss them.

Dear 13
Get a good look at this one—you’re going to remember him. The cherub face, the voice that rings louder than the one in your own throat; he is the worst thing that ever happened to you. But it will take four more years of being crushed into the margins of your own story to realize that. Right now, right now, he comes dressed as the answer to all of your prayers: looks like God right when you were starting to wonder if there was one. But, darling, if I could go back and keep you away from him, I wouldn’t. He is the atom bomb to your Nevada body and he mushroom-clouds everything that you think you know about yourself.
But he is also one of the only reasons you make it, at all. Broken things always grow back stronger, and now he’s a rumor of a boy with no home that wants him, and you are still standing. And you are stronger.

Dear 11
This is dangerous loving. You are too small, too soft. They are going to make mincemeat of you.

Dear 17
You took it too far—turned lonely into solitary confinement and apathy into a pissing contest. But the betrayals don’t hurt anymore so, hey, you did it. You let the ones who hurt you go. You let everything go. Your body is a steel wall, ninety degrees of unbending Empty. Your first kiss is a boy you hate; you are done leaving voicemails for a boy who might be dead, tomorrow;  they are not the same boy, but they might as well be. You will snowball all this Nothing into an avalanche.

Dear 19
Please stop, please stop, please stop, please stop. You can’t set fire to the hurting.

Now
11 wants to know what you did with your hair. 15 misses Dad and 19 doesn’t. None of us even recognize you and we can’t tell if that’s a good thing or a bad one but 13 is in love and 19 is kicking the shit out of her. And 15 is in love and 19 is setting her hair on fire and 17 says she doesn’t know what love means. 11 cried her eyes out yesterday and 17 didn’t do anything. How did you grow up on the backs of so many broken things? How strong can a bed of eggshells be? 15 is starving for affection—can’t remember the last time she was touched. 13 still has nightmares about the boy on the bus and the grin on his face and his hand down the front of her jeans and the way her heart felt like a chicken-wire fence caught in a hurricane. 13 didn’t get out of bed today. 17 sees the boy and hugs him instead of hitting him and feels sick for weeks but 19 is a survivor and she tells the rest of us to get the fuck over it.
What we mean is… are you happy? Because 19 made homes out of beds that she didn’t belong in and we just want 21 to make it.
Are you making it?

"

"To whoever loves me next,
 
I’m sorry if I’m afraid of you
or if days of flirting turn to
radio silence, without warning.
I’m sorry if I make you say the words
over and over and over until I believe them.
(I’m sorry if I don’t believe them.)
I will probably spend more time
worrying about losing you than I spend
trying to keep you. Trouble is,
every single time I’ve ever thought
something was too good to be true–
I’ve been right.
Understand,
I will know how to be vulnerable with you,
but I won’t know how not to regret it.
And I have no idea how deep we’ll be
into this relationship before I admit
I’ve never done this before.
Not really.
Not in any way that counts.
Before I admit that I know
how to put my body inside someone else’s
but not how to make it beautiful.
I probably won’t be easy to love.
Too many people loved me badly,
I’m not sure I know how
to do it right."

"

Sometimes it feels like beautiful
is the party of the year, and I wasn’t invited
(but I went anyway).
And inside, the baseline pulses
with my heartbeat and there are all these
perfect mouths: open and laughing
in the strobing darkness.
A boy who is all sharp jaw and white teeth
settles in behind me, hands on my hips,
close enough to kiss–
he leans in, licks his lips, says:

Sorry. I thought you were somebody else.

The joke
is that I am always trying to be
someone else.
It’s a magic trick, and
I haven’t gotten the hang of it, yet.
But it is a chore to love this body.
And on the days I do love it,
I usually don’t like the person inside of it.
I used to joke that all my sex appeal
instantly disappears the minute I open
my mouth.
I don’t say that anymore,
because that’s a shitty thing to say about yourself.

But the point still stands
that I feel helplessly awkward
being the person that I am.
Sometimes, I think my heart is actually
that sweet, pale pink you find
in babies’ bedrooms:
an organ made, not of blood, but
of the compressed powder from
a makeup compact. Softly blushing.
Given to crumble.

Sometimes I think that I’m only loud
so you won’t see how bad I’m shaking.
All this bravado to make up for the fact
that I am inherently fragile.
All these panic attacks dressed up as poetry,
just cries for help, desperately begging you
to love me.

You have no idea how many years I have been
second choice.
Imagine, being nobody’s first priority:
the one who’s left but never the one who leaves.
Trust me when I say, I know what it means
to keep swallowing pride
just to give your heart something
to eat.
Because when you don’t feel worthy,
you’ll take anything.

In the aftermath,
I stitch my body up with
one night stands and stolen kisses.
I write myself into my own story
as the villain, because I feel like
a poor excuse for a hero.
I keep collecting compliments in a jar
on the bedside table, hoping that maybe
if the jar gets full
I might finally be able to believe them.
It is hard to believe the people telling you
you are beautiful
when there is so much evidence to the contrary:
when there is so much unrequited love,
an entire childhood full of bullying,
when the ones who kiss you are
never the ones who stay.

So today
I am rebuilding what it means
to feel beautiful.
Today, beautiful is
knees covered in sidewalk chalk.
Today, beautiful is
hands riddled with paper cuts.
It’s bitten nails and bedhead.
Beautiful
is a warm cup of coffee and
someone to share it with.
Today, beautiful is something tangible:
something that I can get
and I can give
and I want all of you
to have it.

"

"She pins you to hotel doors—
not a goddess anymore,
but she still looks like religion in high heels.
She kisses you godless. Whispers,We dress like princesses to go out and kill kings."