Attack of the Vengeful Sinuses!

My sinuses hate me. This is the only logical explanation I can think of as to why I have had this stupid, clingy cold for five days now, complete with a cough and crazy sinus symptoms. It's not even a sinus infection. It's just...Hostile Sinus Syndrome. If that's not a real name for a disease, it totally should be.


Anyway, what better thing to do when I'm sitting here in my sweats surrounded by tissues than post more of my thesis? ...Don't answer that.

My Heart in Armor

The black lipstick was an accident.

It was Chloë’s Halloween costume –

looked better on me –

and I bought my own.

Between baggy black pants and

a black Care Bears shirt

I’d never looked better.

I am a Goth, though shamefully inept.

I prefer Italian arias to Metallica,

chocolate chip cookies to marijuana,

leggy blonde women to grungy heavy-metal men.

The eye shadow takes ten minutes to put on perfectly,

the lipstick another two.

Fifteen minutes devoted to untangling necklaces,

clasping them behind my neck,

fastening safety pins to available surfaces,

picking out the perfect earrings…

I’m late for school most mornings.

This is how I’m beautiful.

The black lipstick was an accident,

but once it was on me

everything fit into place.

Now, without it, I’m naked;

people say I look tired and

ask if I’m feeling all right.

Black is the color of sad hearts.

Without my armor,

my being floats unanchored,

so I hide inside it,

both amused and offended when

my therapist tells me about the woman

who saw me in the waiting room,

convinced I do drugs –

I don’t –

and constantly cut myself –

I wouldn’t call it constant.

I look good in black.

The black lipstick was an accident.

Everything else was on purpose

because

this is how I’m beautiful...

Dear Emily

(Written in a journal on April 17, 2003)

I want you so badly.

If you were mine I’d love you always.

I would never let you down.

I want to feel your warm breath on my face as I fall asleep

I want to come home to you every day and lie in your arms into the late hours of the morning.

Be mine and you will never need to be lonely ever again.

Be mine and I will be yours to love until the day I die.

Love me and I will never need to be sad in the entirety of the remainder of my life.

Love me and our lives will never need another reason.

Decisions

Today, in a moment of clarity so extreme it’s almost blinding, I am absolutely positive I am a lesbian.

It’s barely eight A.M. and I have never been more alert.

I blinked. Then I saw it. Me.

It was that simple.

Sweet Sixteen

Too early on a cold morning we pull into the high school parking lot.

I get out on the passenger’s side because I didn’t get my learner’s permit today like I’m supposed to want to.

EmJay21275: Why has your week been bad? It’s your birthday!

Fourth period looms in the distance – math, and I have a test.

There’s a cement mixer in my head and the concrete has hardened in my nose.

I’ve had a cold for four days now.

EmJay21275: What do you have third period?

CryingFaerie22: Chemistry, why?

EmJay21275: I have to go.

I don’t get to leave school until late tonight.

I have play rehearsal again and it’s parents’ night. Rehearsal ends at nine and I’ll wait in the library with my homework for my parents to finish meeting my teachers because they couldn’t do it another time when I’ll already have been sixteen for a little while.

EmJay21275: Cheer up because it’s your day, not anyone else’s!

Something feels different as I leave chemistry class.

For some reason the air around me tingles with promise even though I have a headache and I can’t breathe through my nose.

I see her feet first and her smile next:

Emily.

My love, my dreams, my undoing.

She leans against the hall of lockers like she’s meant to be there all along, holding a plate of brownies and a homemade card.

“Happy birthday,” she says, and I forget to see anything else as she hands me the plate and hugs me.

I think I turn sixteen today. It’s not really important.

The brownies are sweet, but Emily is sweeter. Our late-night internet conversation replays in my head over and over and I know immediately

I’ll never forget it.

I wonder when the last time was that she made brownies and a card for her boyfriend.

Suddenly I’m twenty feet tall. I could be sixteen. I could be thirty. It doesn’t matter.

On top of the card, on top of the brownies is one candy heart. It’s yellow.

“Smile,” it says.

I think I will.

Bloodletting

Fists clenched, I know there is no other choice

than to drag a thumbtack across my wrist

as hard as I possibly can. There’s no blood,

and I am both disappointed and relieved.

I hide the thumbtack under the table and

try to keep listening to my biology lesson.

That first time I did not learn my lesson

and stop hurting myself. I make a choice

that seems perfect each time, the only answer, and

yet each time I cut my stomach, my wrist,

or my leg, I cry and am never relieved.

Still, I am fascinated as I watch my blood

and my pain surface on my skin. Blood

tastes like pennies and something sweet, a lesson

learned over time. I am always relieved

when the bleeding stops. I make this choice

sometimes, when I’m sad and alone – I cut my wrist

but never want to die. Still, I crave the release, and

one time I scratch kiss marks on my arm – XXX – and

then I get scared and wear long sleeves to hide the blood.

I lie to the school nurse, get caught, and my wrist

heals slowly. Everyone sees. I learn my lesson.

Still, those kiss marks are the only choice.

Overwhelmed by the world, at once I am relieved:

Scissors in hand, terrified and angry give way to relieved.

At once I stand up, toss my homework aside, and

make what seems to be the only logical choice.

I press hard on my arm and draw blood

the smell of metal. I forget the lesson

I’m supposed to read for homework. My wrist

is more important. I stare at my wrist

scared, nauseated, excited, and relieved.

I promise myself this time I’ll learn my lesson

because I can’t keep doing this. It’s wrong and

I’ll just keep hurting no matter how much blood

I draw. Deep down I always know it’s the wrong choice.

I put antiseptic on my wrist and

am relieved to see that some blood

remains: a harsh reminder; my lesson...my choice.

Reading Between the Lines

From the back seat of the car:

“Dad, can you hand me the flashlight

from the glove compartment?

I can’t see the mirror to fix my makeup.”

Before he can, my mother:

“You had time in the house to fix your makeup.”

I just thought of it now.

I wonder:

“What difference does it make?”

(“Thanks, Dad.”)

He gives me the flashlight; my mother is not pleased:

“Now, it’s an inconvenience.”

My hand still on my eyelid, thinking:

Mom…am I an inconvenience?