I say I still suffer

But I no longer pick my nails

As white as they are now

They have started to return

Dirt in the bedding

Spots on the ivory

Shown struggle from years

Where I would scrap all the fiber

I made a promise some years ago

That when I switch the timing

Stop wasting what should grow

Then happiness would find me

But what I barely knew

What I didn’t expect

Was the wealth of other things

And dreams that would erect

To pick was my therapy

A cap on my anxiety

To crush my own fingertips

Under teeth that were grinding

Was ultimately

An escape for me

A controlled kind of eruption

A destruction I’d accept

Because I could damage my own bedding

And disturb none who slept

And when I wept

Yes, when I wept

I knew I wasn’t ready,

To stop picking yet

But now in the relent

When the nails should be dead

They are growing because they show me

There is more growing ahead

Happiness is fleeting

People to be meeting

Destruction and creation

In a cycle that is fleeting

Repeating

But when my heart, soul and body

Convine in a meeting

They decide they want to grow

As long as my lungs are still breathing