i.
Sandblasted veins
Pump crimson
As I stare
Out my window.
Perched on my wardrobe,
Like a gargoyle haunting
My tenous thoughts,
Green hand-blown glass.
Within grasp, within reach, within.
I can reach
And end the
Haunted noise in my head.
Purge the noise that wracks me
With chemical
Diagnostics
And disastrous retroactives.
Feel black smoke ravage my lungs
And feel brain
Drift, drift, drift,
Drift, drift, drift.
But. I’m trying
To see life
Going on and on
With this clarity.
Without the cloud.
Without me
In the dark.
Creating my own light.
I stab my thigh
With 25 gauge
And smile gleefully
As I feel it flow.
Better than any bong
Changing this self
Minute by minute
Is a delightful thrill.
With one pull,
One gleeful jab,
One sinful push,
It cleared.
Exacto-knife sharp cuts
Through terse and
Hateful, burgeoning thoughts
Leaving fresh wounds
I let heal
With new growth,
A glossy finish
Of my own health.
I’m free
From a cloud
In my mind
For the moment.
ii.
It’s been a week
Of sacred hope
And staring dolefully
At my self.
Waiting.
Watching.
Wishing.
Wondering.
And it happened.
Changes sprouted hungrily
And flourished gleefully
In my chest.
What was once
Blasted, by time,
Flattened, by doubt,
Grew new life.
It’s pleasantly painful.
Spiky, piercing, thorny.
Uncomfortable.
Gratifying.
The green gargoyle
Remains comfortably sitting.
Unlit, and unused
Perched.
I think
I’ll let it lie
Just for a moment
And focus, concentrate,
Piercing dark clouds
With 23 gauge steel,
Alcohol wipes, MCT oil,
An enanthate engagement
With the goddess-self,
Her delightful influence
Writ upon my skin,
Sparkling in my smile.
Back before now
When I was in
The prison
Of my skin
A day, a week,
And a month
And a year
Felt the same in here.
One hundred and eighty four days
Of nervous apprehension
Turned me into
A knotted, stressful wreck.
I was trapped
In a cluster
Of cancerous cells
Tumors, and thrombotic veins.
Smooth steel bars
I melted down
For needle points
And knife blades.
I cut out dead flesh
Sloughed it away, featherlight.
Born anew from
the waste of the old.
Long live the new flesh.
Long live my new self.
Long live the goddess
In my heart.
iii.
I kiss the sun
In her greeting
As I rise,
Salutations to the day
I praise the moon
In her delightful
Reprisals of herself,
Reflections of mother sun.
Salutations
To a new day
In the light
Of heavenly bodies.
My/Our body
Reaches their heights,
Through polish,
And growth.
What was once
A hell of self
Is now home,
Remodeled, redone, remade.
A rigid structure
Shifted
Ever so slightly
With our determination
Fervor
Delight
Desire
Drugs.
I once thought
I was trash.
A disaster.
Worthless?
Now?
I am me.
In every way
I was meant to be.
There is no end
To the person
I can become
And the people
I will help
To follow me
On this journey
To myself.