A Small Hole

   What a sweet burn.  It ignites in my heart and burns through my veins to the tips of my fingers and toes.  Orgasmic.  Intoxicating.  Frustrating.  I can't feel my heart any longer through the burning.  The heat, so intense, has made a hole through the core of my being.  How can I give you what you need, when I cannot satisfy myself?  
   The cardboard falls to the floor, released from numb fingers.  I cannot see you.  I cannot feel you.  I step and fall.  Picking myself up again, I continue to move.  Sharp, the pain.  The anger.  Too pretty.  Sometimes I think I shouldn't be pretty, for I get myself into too much trouble.  Blue eyes.  I should gauge them out.  However, it's all for naught.  How do I turn you away?  Nice hair... I can ruin my hair.  Step and fall.  Pick myself up again.  The first cut is always the most dangerous.  Clumps of my hair float to the floor, making beautiful designs of pain and longing.  Stop.
   Pretty lips... I can hurt my lips.  Thirty minutes out of my way.  The wind that normally felt so peaceful on my face did nothing to placate me.  God, the burning is so painful.  My entire being is shaking.  I can't control my laughter.  It gurgles out of me and I try to find words to express the sensation.  Nothing.  I am simply floating in blackness filled with nothing but anger.  Self-loathing.  I am hideous to myself.  I am hateful and uncaring.  I used to be beautiful.  The outside should match the inside.  I am not beautiful anymore.  
   I am not beautiful anymore.
   I am not beautiful anymore.
   I am not beautiful anymore.
        The words echo in the caverns of my childish emotions.  Emotions I can't control, I can't harness.  Do not love me.  Do not want me.  Do not touch me.  I used to be smart.  I used to be wise.  I used to be caring.  I used to want... to want to dream, to want to succeed, to want to laugh without care.  Now, I no longer deserve those.  I used to want to beautiful again.  I used to want to hope.  
   My nerves stretched out taught.  Visions flashing in my mind.  5:22am.  He opens the sterile packaging.  A crack of light as the door opens.  He marks my lip.  Tied to the wall as I'm beaten and bruised.  I laugh as he lines everything up.  Pinned on the beach looking at the beautiful stars.  He mentions that I should take a deep breath.  Thrown against pizza boxes that are sharp and uncomfortable.  His needle slides through.  I want to cry.  I want to scream and yell and beat the walls and tear myself out of my skin.  I want to be perfect again!  I want to be whole!  I want to be beautiful!  I want to feel human and loved and.... it's done.
   I sit up and look in the mirror.  My mind is very calm.  The ring is small.  All the burning has left my heart and moved to my lip.  I feel nothing else.  I almost cry, but eyes are looking.  Always looking.  So, I smile and think-- if only this was enough.  If only I was enough.  Enough for everyone else.  Enough for myself.  Two days later I sit, looking at beautiful people and comparing them to myself.  They look whole.  They look complete and happy.  I look at the ring in my lip.  Now, I can't hide any more.  I am marked.  I am imperfect.  I hate it.  I hate it like I hate myself.  I hate myself like I hate those that did this to me.  
   Stupid... thoughtless.  My life in chaos.