My life is falling apart Ripping at the seams Unable to be sewn back Scattered across Tugged this way and that Helping you helping them Listening, Feeling, Comforting But what about me? I am nog your doll? I need yo be listened to! I need to be felt! I need fo be comforted! I need someone to sew me back together. But no one comes to the rescue So i am left to fend for myself Left to scrounge in the wild. No one is safe. I will destroy my path Hurt those who hurt me. Because I need to be listened to, I need to be felt, I need to be comforted to. The cracks in my soul That no glue can hold together Medicine makes me sick Drugs make me crazy Love makes me insane But I need to be listened to, I need to be felt, I need to be comforted to. But if you refuse Then I will deal with this unquenchable thirst myself. You leave me to starve The seams keep ripping and tge cacks get bigger Until I burst and I break and because of you I will never be the same

I couldn't watch her eat. It was something I only realised as I grew older. I suddenly noticed, what it actually looked like.

Those tiny teeth in her small mouth. Reaching over something far too big to fit her mouth. Getting crumbs and such on the side of her mouth.

Her teeth yellow and discolored. Not like a poor person's teeth. Like teeth of someone with means to brush and get them fixed when damaged.

Someone with every opportunity and the means to take care of her teeth. But the lack of skill and character to do so.

My picture of her is always that she is eating standing. Or sitting awkwardly. Eating fast. One hand to her mouth. Another reaching across the table to grab something or other for someone.

She has four kids, a husband - who doesn't cock or clean - and a rather large golden retriever, who lacks manners and is laying under the table, waiting for scraps.

There was never any time for her to eat properly. Or there was never a sense of time for her to take, and eat properly. At the table. Slowly. Two hands on knife and fork.

Small bites. Chewing. Stopping to take a sip of her glas. Or responding to a question.

There was also no time for civil conversation. It was in, sit, grab, eat and leave. The mother trying to get all kids to eat without yelling. Sharing potatoes and pieces of chicken equally and to everyones best liking.

She would take something for herself last. Or simply wait and eat whatever was left.

It was not the best of terms for proper eating.

Even so, I couldn't look at it. The food in mouth, open, crumbs on the side, on her chest. Using her fingers to crab an extra piece of bread. Talking while chewing. Multitasking, but poorly.

There was no grace. No air in her step. No lightness or easyness in her moves.

It was rough. Hurried. As if the house could come tumbling down upon the family at any moment. Every hour was fixated on getting through this hour. Getting through a meal. Getting through a car trip. Packing. Vacation drives.

And don't even get me started on school mornings.

Only on Fridays was there a sense of a collective sigh. She was relaxed. And so the whole family was relaxed. There was no hurry. No place to go or problem to solve. The house was steady.

Sometimes there would be celebrations or gatherings with friends or family members. She would dress up with red lipstick and nails. She would put her curly hair up on the top of her head. She would be excited and happy, exhilarated even. As if going out as a family was the only time she really lived. This was life.

The other days we're survival.

This was my mother.

And every time I took a bite, I would see how my mouth would take bites too big for me, and feel the crumbs on the side, and falling on to my chest.

And I'd be disgusted by myself. Thinking that this is her legacy. That I should have turned out better. Learned myself to eat better.

Fearing that my daughters have already learned to eat like me now. Like her.

Rough. Cracked. Ravenous.

_(Author’s Note: This is one of the longest stories I’ve ever written, but I promise it’s worth it. Thanks for reading! <3) _

“Again!”

Nikolai held his head in exhaustion. He had been at it for literal hours. Shadow warping himself so he can be “invisible”. But the closest he’d gotten was a dark cloud surrounding him that sparked with white hot electricity. Definitely not what he was going for.

“I need a break.” He panted to his mentor, Aldric.

Aldric, a man whose indifference to Nikolai was as palpable as it was suffocating.

Nikolai never had a choice in his training. He even tried once runnning away. A stupid idea of course. The minute he was caught, the punishment came swiftly—broken ribs,bruises, the familiar agony of failure.

“A break?” Aldric asked quietly.

_Oh hell… _Nikolai thought and braced himself.

Sure enough, a swift backhand raced across his cheak, sending him sprawling to the floor and almost impaling himself on his own knife. Aldric walked forwards and grabbed a fistful of Nickolai’s black hair and pulled him up.

“Are you weak?!” Aldric asked. “Do you not have what it takes to be an Elite? In 14 days time you will be in that trial and you will die. All becuase you needed… a break.”

Nikolai stayed quiet. He knew better than to speak. When Aldric goes on a rampage it’s better to stay silent than tempt the beast.

Aldric shoved Nikolai back to the floor and kicked him in the side, “Do it again I said!”

Nikolai fought back tears of pain and clutched his side. He staggered up and hid his face under his bangs. It would only get worse if Aldric saw him showing any weakness.

He summoned another shadow cloud and clutched it to himself tightly. He focused all his energy, desperate for anything to go right. But atlas, the cloud flickered once, twice, and then fizzled away.

Nikolai slowly looked up to see a fuming Aldric clamping down on his sword at his side.

“Draw your weapon, boy.” He spat.

With shaking hands, Nikolai drew his knife, the familiarity making him a bit more steady in his feet.

“Aldric, I’m sorry. But I’m exhausted. Maybe I can try again in a few minutes.” Nikolai mumbled.

But there was a hard resolve in Aldric’s cold gaze, “Fighting stance.” He called.

Before Nikolai was even completely ready, Aldric lunged forward with his sword, nearly splitting him in two. Nikolai rolled backwards and swept his leg out, but Aldric jumped over it with ease and continued his assault.

For what felt like hours Nikolai played defense, but just barely. With every second he tired. Limbs slowly turning into weights of sand. His shadow warping ability becoming less and less portent as he used it.

Eventually, Aldric disarmed him and held his sword close to Nikolai’s neck. The cold bite of Aldric’s blade was the last thing Nikolai needed.

His entire body was on the verge of giving out, his legs wobbling beneath him as exhaustion sank deeper into his bones. His shadow warping, the one skill he can rely on, faltered once again, a weak flickering cloud that dissolved into nothing.

The sword pressed harder, beads of blood starting to show, and for the briefest moment, Nikolai wondered if this is how it ended.

Not in the trial, but here in this pit of endless suffering. A failure, taken by the sheer weight of the training he had to endure for 15 years.

Aldric’s breaths came in sharp controlled gasps as he stood over Nikolai.

“You won’t take a break until I say you can.” Aldric growled, his voice low and filled with the same unyielding cruelty that had never softened. “You think you’re weak now? You think you deserve rest? In two weeks, you’ll be in that trial. You’ll be fighting for your life. And if you can’t even handle a lesson, how do you think you’re going to survive out there?”

Nikolai bit his lip, swallowing the bitterness rising in his throat. His body screamed in protest, but he didn’t dare speak, didn’t dare show any weakness.

He knew Aldric wouldnt tolerate it.

Not now, not ever.

“I’m not here to pamper you, boy. I’m here to break you, to make sure your strong enough to survive.” Aldric glared at him with something colder than anger in his eyes, “You don’t deserve rest—not yet.” __ __ Nikolai didn’t respond once again. He didn’t have the strength to do it.

Aldric reached down and grabbed him by the collar, lifting him off the ground with a causal force.

“Now listen to me carefully. Go to the healer inside. Get yourself patched up, and when you’re healed enough, you will come back out here. We will continue this lesson. Understood?”

“Yes Aldric.” Nikolai rasped.

He shoved Nikolai away, the force knocking him back to the ground, “Get up!” Aldric barked, his voice devoided of any compassion. “And remember this: you’re not a _child. _If you want to survive, you’ll stop whining and get back to work. When I say jump, you better ask how high.”

Nikolai forced himself to stand, clutching his side where the pain was sharpest. He didn’t trust his voice, so he just nodded again.

Aldric’s eyes followed him, as cold as ever. “Two more weeks Nikolai. Then the trial. And if you think you’ll find mercy there, you’ll be as dead as the others who’ve come before you.

Nikolai didn’t respond. There was nothing to be said. He turned and headed towards the healer’s quarters, every step aching. But he kept moving.

Becuase in two weeks he’d be free.

And then—he’d have the power he was so hungry for.

There’s always some kind of line between breaking and broken

You often don’t know you’re past it until it’s too late

There’s always a moment where you can be saved

And a moment where you find you’ve come too far

That turning back would be harder

Something inside you has cracked splintered turned to dust

And instead of living with a hole inside you complacent to what the world does throwing one thing after another never ending

Now

well now

now you are not

not going to sit and watch not going to be a spectator in your own life not going to watch as day after day after day passes by in a blur of motion

You are the embodiment of hunger Feasting on every moment as if it may be your last Ravenous to the world surrounding you Wanting more and more And More MORE MORE MORE MORE MORE MOREMOREMOREMOREMOREMOREMORE

and yes society

society will do what society does best and label you

as crazy depressed on the edge almost gone

but they can’t see what we can

we are living for the first time

Have you ever been lost. Not just being seperated from the group, lost. You can’t see the sun to get orentated and at this point you have turned and twisted every way. Here of all places in the swamps of Oklahoma. Yes apperently Oklahoma has at least one swamp. What makes this so terrible is all the story’s that live in these woodyswamps. As night approaches I see a dark figure behind a tree that is so unfamiliar to me. I here a whistle of a pitch that is like no other bird I have heard. That is the moment I see a creature calling to me with no words. A creature like no other. It’s skin is a color of tree bark rough and cracked and the gray eyes look ravenous to me.

I saw it yesterday, maybe the whole package too.

I’m not sure what/how the whole clothes/covering situation works for creature-y beings and honestly, I don’t really want to know. This entire thing is freaking me out.

I just about lost it, couldn’t even tell what it had been, rancid and rotten and raw—and it was eating it.

Ravenous.

There I was, innocently walking outside my own house and I’d seen it.

Always said I was going to move to the suburbs. There is absolutely no reason to have a forest in the backyard.

My therapist has been saying for the longest that I need to “start taking care of myself” and whatever.

Of course the second I try I get flipped off by the universe.

I wish I could trick myself into thinking I’d seen a wolf.

I tried, I really did, but wolves don’t have eyes with cracked purple pupils, I’m sure they don’t and if they do, Google failed me too—

“What did he look like?”

“It **It. **Sherlene, don’t play with me. I’m opening up to you and you’re here making googly eyes for a mythical creature!”

“No, for sure but—“

The sound men

The sound men

The sound, sound men make with their dry lips around the rim of empty bottles, speaking their foul breath into the glaringly empty amber pit

(that little whimper of the strong man, who can’t lift himself from the bottle)

the sound

the sound

the unsound sound that bleeding bears make in the falling woods when caught in jagged men-traps

you study the poet in their natural habitat (I’d wager it’s hell, really I’ve $50 that it is)

the world is a zoo

I won another $50

for whoring my soul around

I took off my skin and threw it off the stage

if that’s not funny, nothing is

Poetry is like dying

I want to stop but I really can’t help it

I had a thought or a dream maybe that I flew to Victoria with wings of rot and crucified myself near sandridge lookout and you laughed and I laughed and that’s how I’m doing

I guess

I don’t want to be anymore

I don’t want poetry

I don’t know how to want it

God doesn’t believe in me anymore

My soul is rotting again

Just like before, sweet children

Now you have me again

And you can love me

You can have these rough eyes

have my broken mind

take my hungry heart

be a friend to me

watch me fucking die

tell me I’m pretty

I can say I dreamed of you

I was eating my fingers

You didn’t see the poems in me

the didn’t see them spew out

you turned your head

and went to kill God

And I gave you my all

the applause sounded like Frost

my cheers like Poe

Then I turned to dust

and the girl walked over me

kicking me up to the wind

walking in her actual smile

writing something I could never

You’ll only love me if I hate myself

So, clap, you lot

clap until your hands are like mine

live until you’re dead like me

die until you’re alive

tell them all I’ve returned

thrice the ghost I was before

the glass is half dead

pour me around, darlings

around your blistering eyes

I’ll make you see it all like I do

I’ll pull you down into my grave

I’ll make you cold like me

I’ll keep you warm

because we can be friends again

now that I’m falling apart

Now that I’m dead , and dead , and dead again

(Whoever it is 
      that is 
dreaming of me, 

please wake up soon.

I can’t breathe anymore.)

I had a dream you told me that you learned something from me

and I felt equal parts overwhelming pride

and gut wrenching disgust

I only want to know you love me

So I can call you a liar

I suppose I’m sicker than we all thought

Don’t tell my doctor I’ve been skipping days I don’t have the money to get right I don’t have the right to get money

If heaven exists,

something like me shouldn’t ever be there

Isn’t this poetry?

Aren’t we having a good time?

Well…..

Laugh already.

_Oh! _ _ Loosen up! _ _ It’s only poetry! _ __

_Die a little! _

Old western hero John Wayne and Clint Tomorrow no more zero Left without a hint

Rough, cracked and lonesome Gone are those times Ravenous but wholesome Thoughtful and wise

He was dangerous. His ravenous smile and rough hands made me tremble, and my skin craved his touch. His heart was made of cracked stone, but he still bled. He was my nightmare, my heartbreaking dream.

I saw her walking towards me with that ravenous stare in her eye. I knew it well, but not when she was like this. Now, her clothes transformed into lightning streaks, shattering the night sky. Her body moved towards me with serpentine strides, her face a rough distortion of who I knew and loved. She still wore that smile, though. Pink-lipped, teeth wide, eyes open. I backed up, watching as her face stretched so far apart that her eye sockets cracked open, oozing something yellow. Her whole visage cracked into a million pieces as she continued to crawl towards me, where I lay cowering on the floor.

“Stop! Please stop!” I shouted, covered my face.

“Darrel!” I heard her shout, and I lowered my arms to risk one more look at her.

She was whole again, a normal woman. The room seemed so utterly silent.

“Please sign these papers. I know it’s hard for you, but please.” She shoved them towards me.

I ended our marriage with a flick of my pen.