sometimes i close my eyes because the ache inside of my chest has grown to proportions that such a tiny frame cannot handle. each day i wake and in the suspended stasis between life/death sleep/awake ecstasy/misery sometimes i feel whole again and real until the world dribbles out of my ears like blood, a sign that i am no longer here. but where am i if i am not here? it is as if there is nothing inside, i am so very far away and a mere observer from another world, staring through a broken lens and i can't quite remember how to get home. just slightly to the left, a little back and oh wait, there comes the pain again - rushing toward me like a trick, a devious trick that warms me until the world shatters. shatters; a brilliant shard of glass that slices deep into white flesh; flesh that can no longer handle what it contains. what do i contain? am i even contained by my own body or is this flesh receeding and i am no longer here? why do i feel as if i am not here anymore and how do i reconnect with my body? it seems as if there is nothing left and i do not know why i remain. the pull of need is like a vagrant tide, pushing me where i am forced to be and there is no one in a rowboat to come save me. friends? life? everything is gone and there is no one to hold me when i feel as if the contents of my universe are going to spew forth from my gut in an overwhelming display of cataclysmic power; i am nothing; am i nothing? there is so much that i cannot tell anymore and so little that i understand as there is a perpetual fog of destiny that hangs over my head. praying; wishing; dreaming; screaming; i cry a single tear for each insanity that i am praised to have dealt so well with; every urge i have is screaming at me to drag blades across me, only the guilt is far too great. why am i not allowed reprieve? why am i not allowed to be held and gently lulled to sleep, a cool cloth on a burning forehead because nightmares turn to feverdreams of insanity and creativity, innocence lost and hopelessness. always afraid, always alone and i have nowhere to run and nowhere to hide; the only way to leave this perpetual misery is to look down at the world from so very high, upon buildings that i can no longer identify because the world is a blur; looking down/staring down/the world is so very small/one step/a single step/just one last breath/and i can save it all/but every single time i gain the courage to let go someone screams at me, and tells me no because i am so very needed; i need to be held, i need to be soothed; i am a child and a wisened maid all in a package of doom; and the only image i can produce when i want to take that one step is how badly i want someone to wrap their arms around me, hide me in their warmth, and stay with me until i can stop shaking. but all i can do is have these nightmares where i take that one, last, final step... and fall.