I am the suicide letter Sylvia Plath never wrote.

[T.W]

Dated : in darkness; a crumbling faith.

( I am. I am. I am. )

a tear stained paper; moistened but her fingertips never left any prints. I am the burner from where the smoke starts; slithering like a snake up this deliberation of a life. I am the pantry where you'll find her voice and duties trapped into one. the windows open to a backyard; no clothes hung out to dry on the rack line.

hope should not take my place,

as it always does.

I hole into her being because as soon as she starts writing, her plans collapse. so this time, she won't write. she won't let the world ire her existence through her pain. her pain is not an aesthetic stamp on a postcard. not the rose on her hair that she is known to put. she is what she wanted to do, wanted to have, wanted to dream.

but all she ever carried was words and impending sadness. lingering, sometimes blotched, sometimes covered under the lovely wails of her children. her dress spoke in ballads. her lipstick was the classic colour of sad, heartbroken art. there are people who can only weave art when their linen is : pain and suffering and lots and lots of unfallen/fallen tears. she was one of them.

life is but, an anomaly. boil her thoughts into a cauldron until life's smoke. it would appear the same even to her sleepy eyes. she wanted to sleep, but she couldn't. the nights used to be too dark. daylight was never the colour she understood. it would darken her world further, just like the way he did. she knew she needed to be more if she were to be wanted. existence is what you call a poet's demise. it unfurls after you're gone.

just the way you read her books. 'poems from one of the world's greatest poets' or something like that. I may not have a name for my compilation, or maybe, if I'm written, I'll be added. laid down like a historical relic. last words? last letter? last something. my hands will no longer be soft, but iron stiff. a quill will find its place never my feet, frozen like the flowers i picked this morning.

so if I write, know that I'm alive. and if not, the smoke will call out to you. tell you stories about my going-through-its, embers of a short lifetime. tell you that it isn't easy to go. it's not the work of a coward to rationalize her own death. it's not unholy to close your eyes and sail through the pain for fifty seconds instead of everyday.

to live the literal life-version of a full stop; as the gurgling wheels of a steam engine nears you. as the shade under a tree that capes you from sunburns; seconds away from drifting like the clouds. the grass grows in you, and sunshine is only a quarter miles away.

we are waiting to melt; for in this world,

we've only lived, frozen.

I was. I was. I was. a clock's tiny engine who knew time was a boundary. a map of bold numbers that decided birth, ion, marriage, love and maybe, a happy ending. time can never read your mind, know your next step. tragedy feels like a gentle sort of concussion in the first 2 seconds and then spreads and grows and ultimately, just stays. stays with you to fan the madness; the zeal to accelerate an ending -- a quick way to leave all behind or find a way out into the unknown.

now that i crucify myself with words, nail my fears and doubts and hopes to the wood, i can be free. i can soar to the skies.

my poetry has birthed me to a new life.

images aren't mine. ctto!!