Poetry by Dana Azizian

              r. nial bradshaw CC



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i try to tell my therapist that i have forgotten my body 

and she tells me to go find it, then / step back into the device that carried you from one suffering / to the next one / ornate with souvenirs / please god let me be something / else / anything / i tell her something dark engulfed me / carried thru air & space & away & away / she asks when the pain started / well / i was a happy child / (my mother tells me) / i don’t remember being a happy child / i remember sirens and screaming and shattering / so etched in / they all play in my head still / broken record / doom me to a fate of reproducing the breaking / of bones of skin / of plates of food i absolutely will not eat, damn it / the body is an echo chamber / the body hosts / nightmares / of busted lips and skulls and the fear he’d finally done her in / broken kid / broken family / the image sheening behind my eyes / fear the foundation of all things / shame the god i knelt by the bed to / i still do / anything to appease / i’d break my bones for you i hope you believe it / i hope it haunts you, what you did to me / does it haunt you? / does it? does it? / through the eyes of a young girl / it’s all violence / and moonlight / nights spent on cold tile / there is no way of knowing / when the new morning will make a victim of me / and when i get over my hunger / which i will / i know this / i will hand it off to the world and it’ll take me in its teeth / i will put all my madness into the toilet bowl / but then where / pray tell / am i to put the toilet bowl / and the madness i’m still staring into? / i want to go tell everyone who will listen / hey hey look at me / look at this broken thing aren’t i so / broken / hey look at me am i still worth looking at / well. / am i?

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Dana Azizian is a young queer poet in Vancouver, BC. Her work is inspired by the natural world and topics of mental illnesses with which she has struggled, as a firm believer in the healing powers of creation. She is so excited to be writing and living and writing about life, which she finds beautiful, awful, and wonderful. Find her on twitter at @dana__june

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