I remember you asking me, “Why do you cut yourself open like that?” I didn’t know the answer until the words came out of me; the vessel carrying contents unknown, the messenger reading lines unwritten and unread.

“Because no one else will do it for me.”

No one else will splay me wide, every expression, every sentence laid bare.

No one else will flay the truth from my bones. I, alone, can point to my chest and unravel what rustles inside. I am the only one capable of writing poetry about myself, for it is in pulling oneself apart that the self is sought, and in seeking, the self is uncovered, centimeter by centimeter.

Poetry, that sacred self-harm, that twisted act of grotesque curiosity, is the knife by which I cut. I cut a deep slash down the center of my being, pry myself open like a fisherman gutting prey (gutted, guttering, candle-quick), and unearth identity.

It is terrifying, beautiful.

The pain of carving into oneself can be bitter at times, but the love of the act gleams around it; enshrouds it, halo-like.

The love of poetry blinds me to the agony of self-dissection.