In white houses

Ten years old and all softness
and innocence, thick hair and
a round belly. I am carefree and
calloused palms, my hands are
painted in colors from handfuls
of candy and evenings spent
outside with sidewalk chalk.

My parents tell me to watch
what I am eating, their words
are all sweetness and artificial
flavor, and even though they
are supposed to be healthy,
they leave a bitter aftertaste.

I begin to measure, the number
of times I can tie a jump rope  
around my neck just to gag
these awful thoughts, how
many cups of food I can throw
down the drain and get away
with, how many strands of hair
I can watch fall from my dead mind.

How to lose twenty
pounds in three weeks:

Week 1. Throw out your
heart and lose seven
pounds instantly, you
will not want it anymore
when you lie for the ninth
time in one day, when your
sister catches you crying at
the kitchen sink as you throw
out your favorite food.

Week 2. Lose four pounds
as you spend an hour in the
bathroom cleaning out all
the messy thoughts from
your hairbrush, all the tangled
strands of hair and you can
only feel your skin tearing on
the bristles, you are supposed
to be beautiful but suddenly
everything is so messy, all
numbers and losses.

Week 3. Lose nine pounds and
nine hours of sleep when your
body shakes so much as you
try to sleep that you wonder
when rocking yourself to
sleep become a lullaby,
when time started to eat
you away.

Your entire life will just become
weeks and numbers, lessons on
how to end your life quicker.

But now, the only numbers
I count are the number of
years I lost, all those hours
I spent hoping my stomach
would collapse on the empty
shell I called my body, all
those minutes I was only
falling deeper into a grave
of the person I once was.

And now, I remember that
the only flowers I received
were to mourn all the things 
I wasted, opportunities and 
tastes, all the lost relationships
and torn up skin.

And now, the only memory
I miss is when I still had
time, when I should have
been outside rather than
locked up in my own mind,
when I should have been
reading books instead of diet
plans, when I could have been
learning more about people rather
than a body’s damn metabolism.