Don’t

Don’t avoid the person in the mirror, never spending more than a few seconds to acknowledge her existence because to do that would be to absorb her ugliness and failings when you already know them all, are able to recite them on request, a worn cassette of self loathing that you knowingly feed every day; spoiled fruit.

Don’t appreciate your body, what is it but an underachieving lump of flesh that will never achieve what you aspire to.

Don’t listen.

Don’t absorb it.

Don’t agree…anymore.

Don’t form part of the conspiracy, don’t collude with your illness.  Don’t wait until the oceans absorb your soul and the wind carries your ashes to coat the earth’s crust; a song never heard, a ghostly echo ascending the heavens.

Don’t wait for someone else’s validation, for a sign or a quick fix.  Don’t put your faith in anything else but you!

Don’t hide in the church toilets cutting lines down your legs purging your own misconceived rottenness, sodden tissues clinging to your thighs as you resume your place upon the pew.

Don’t wait so long to forgive yourself, for being you.

There truly never was anything to absolve.

T x