Skeletal, she says, I wish to be skeletal
Ghastly thin
A creature of beauty
Fragile bones tearing through translucent skin
Shadows resting in the hollow havens of her sickly body.

Her lips were stained with want
Her eyes pleading for what her mouth refused
She dreamed of pulling the flesh from her body piece by piece
Lessen me, she says, lessen my existence.

Her weakened limbs hung limply at her sides
Her energy exhausted rapidly from desperate breathing
You're skin and bones, they said, skin and bones
She smiled with her thin, stained lips.

She vandalized her body with deprivation
Her fingertips carving poetry into her bird-like bones
They bled through on to her skin
A novel written by an esurient creature without a pen.

Withered fingers trembled delicately with weighted burdens
Tears of lost control whispered down her cheeks
And through her empty veins
The bitter taste of famine danced on her tongue as the gun quivered against her skull
Make me beautiful, she said, make my corpse beautiful.


*This poem is dedicated to anyone who has struggled with an eating disorder or struggled with body image.