Deep Burning

I hunger.
It's hard to concentrate. My head hurts, and I'm exhausted - much more so than usual. Everything is fuzzy. I've been dreaming.
As I lose focus I become more and more shapeless. What was once my face now droops. My arms are swollen and blobby. I need to get it together or I may end up as nothing but a smear. We are scattered. Trapped. So close... but without light, we are lost.
We faced nightmares in that tower. But something has us. What?
Wraith stayed behind. Perhaps she is our only hope.

I have some memories that are not mine.
There is a memory I have of dancing with someone in the rain. I do not know who she is. I remember her face, dimly. She was smiling. I have never gone dancing in the rain. Some day I hope to.
I remember a woman, tied down to a table. Brown-skinned, naked. Someone lowers a spinning blade onto her face. Her screams haunt me.
I remember falling. Falling so very, very far.
I remember lying slumped against a brick wall, cold rain falling onto the bleeding ring on my chest. Was it a broken bottle? Seems to be.
I remember something painful. It does not bear repeating.
I remember a wedding.
I remember so very, very little.

She was right, you know. I do think I'm beyond loving. And why not? In my eyes I'm a parasite - I worm my way into a person's heart, eating them from the inside. I don't want to hurt them, of course... but who would knowingly live with a worm? I create a happy fantasy and destroy everything. Only a few times have I had a kiss that wasn't stolen. I've made it clear I don't have much to give, but even that's been spread so thin I don't know if anything beats in my chest any more.
There are... a few people I would give my heart to. If I thought I deserved them. Maybe when I can stand on my own two feet I'll be welcome a pillar to lean on.

Such bloodlust... I can't go on like this. If I end up hurting someone I swear I'll kill myself. Skeleton will be even less forgiving. At times it's hard not to see people as meat. I'm losing.

My mother doesn't understand why I'm upset. According to her, my depression is under control, and since I just have "a few mental problems" I shouldn't really have that much to complain about, should I? Those questions that are not questions, which serve less to convince me and more to guilt me into agreeing. To her, it's a small thing. These are the people who are the most discouraging, the ones who can't grasp the big picture: It. Never. Stops. This is not just an occasional problem, it is my Life. I am always haunted by lost memories, by power struggles and identity crises, by almost overwhelming fears and angers. In an objective world that description isn't good enough. When I fall, people tell me to get up. There's really nothing I can do to express myself besides bursting into tears (which I've been conditioned not to do) or attacking someone (which I must never do). You see my dilemma; I cannot simply get over this as most people get over a bad attitude. It's like a physical impediment, a deliberating disease. I am a multiple. I am an invisible cripple. I am the rightfully oppressed. I cope, just about... but still, you know?

Oh well. You have to laugh. I suppose.

Festival Haiku
Smoke in the night air
Dancing, feasting, cruel laughter
Blood in October