The Ache of Creativity

I want to buy sixteen Halloween costumes and wear them
during the third week of every month
that isn’t October
and I will never answer a single person
when they ask me why—I will pass them,
witchy-fingered, evil-eyed,
entirely in character,
I won’t even smile

Someone told me today that I am so lucky that
I am smart and talented—he wishes he could make
such beautiful art,
but on most days I feel that is the opposite of luck
I just want to sleep
I don’t want to earn degrees and throw my name onto books,
I’m sorry that I’m too tired to learn anything
I’m sorry that I know too much to sleep
but I sleep so much
as a result of never sleeping, the combination of the two
is nothing like insomnia, and all of this—
I wouldn’t call it luck.
It’s more like a costume. I won’t even smile.

The Anvil Diet

sometimes people tell me
to stop worrying about
my weight
like I hadn’t already been trying
like the idea of
shoving the worry to recess on the moon
wasn’t already my favorite
I carry the launch in my backpack
on the way to school sometimes
ignorance sounds a lot like
“you don’t even need a diet”
“you’re not that big”
“life is too short to worry about it”

life is too long
to be stuck longing to be
yourself in a different way
to say “I will always be here
I will just change the way you see me
I will be altering my first impressions
and my right to exist.”

this weight is an anvil.
ignorance sounds a lot like:
“size doesn’t matter”
“you’re beautiful despite it”
“you’re too young to worry”…

but too damn
old to waste any more of a lifetime
throwing dimes into wishing wells
and picking up lucky pennies
asking for self control
a smaller jean size
the relief echoes
as I walk down
the stairs
to being
myself
again
my
identity
rests within
my ability to shrink

Originally published in the 2014 Overlooked by Overkill at Allegheny College.