Splinters buried to the bone. Headaches like aneurysms - One can only hope. Nightmares ever harder to control. Always in the back of my mind. Never letting go. No, I can't explain this to you because it's different for everyone but I feel like I'm drowning face down in the bathtub. Too weak to pick my head up. This is the voice of nothing. Nothing left to gain. And I'm standing here screaming my lungs out just to ease the pain. The more I fight, the more I fail. Exhaustion. Letting go. But I have learned that healing is something that happens, not something that you do. Pick a scar and tell a story. I'll tell you one of my own about addiction and self-loathing and a lack of self-control and the cuts I couldn't leave alone. So I pick my flesh straight down to the bone. A compulsion. A failed attempt to regain control. Some things are out of our hands. Dreamscapes in orange remind me that the cure for pain. So in my head I just keep repeating, "This too shall pass, This too shall pass, This too shall pass, This too shall pass." Life. Love. Remorse. Regret. Lost hope. This too shall pass. As this began, so shall it end