X ray

Though and through I look at you to look at me

What do I see, well first I see the good parts staring right back

But when the machine turns on and I become see through there’s someone else there

Glaring, hating and plotting against me while I beg her to stop

I sit on my knees and I stare at my thighs salivating at the charming thoughts of what could be

Isn’t that called self sabotage?

But that doesn’t really matter because clearly what matters to me is what you see

So then it’s back to eye level and sea level and I think that means honesty but maybe it’s just brutality and I swim to find the difference but the water is murky and I don’t know how to differentiate the two yet and I’m trying so hard to be nice but

Ugly thoughts take over a few too many times, and when I was a kid I heard that if you think ugly things it starts to show on your physical being

So I do a temperature check and a full body scan

“You don’t mean that” Oh yes I do! I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again

Wait actually no I don’t

I put in my mouth guard and cover my eyes and I shock myself a few times to bring myself back to earth because I’m too far gone and I need to learn to be more……… realistic 

So I scowl in the mirror at myself and I find you, here we are again just me and you

I tell you to lean in close and pick me apart

I invite you to X-ray me but don’t be shocked when I take the bib off and start crying 

Nevermind you have to be nice to me you can only say pleasant things and tell me how great I am how much you love me and every single good thing you can possibly think about me

I’m too sensitive for this I swear

So please,

Blow my ego up just how I like it

and stretch it thin until the tiniest pin pricks it and I deflate down to my shadow and I sink low again when I don’t get what I want

My expectations are high and reality is too far below it its like that scene in 500 Days of Summer where he pictures what he wants and what is actually happening: a split screen 35mm in which I see you and I see me and we seem to be worlds apart

Where am I and where are you? The water is cloudy and I can’t even see my feet now

So we start again back to square one where I meet myself with shame and embarrassment for being a child and I look in the mirror and I think what the hell is going on right now haven’t we been here before and why are we here again 

But there’s no differentiating between the two of us we are still one and that is the part that I wrestle in my sleep and crack my teeth over

I try to let those ugly parts go but I know that I can’t

I’m too self-obsessed

Is this a self diagnosis?

No I think that we all are and you just need to remember that

Where you end I start and where I end you meet me there just to remind me of

The wheel of fortune: what goes up must come down