These scars are not telling you

About some beautiful tragedy.

These scars say

I’m fucked up.

They scream

I hate myself

Enough

To press a blade into my skin.

If you are hearing anything different,

You are mistranslating.

These scars don’t somehow make me strong,

Nor do they suddenly quantify me as weak.

They do not define me.

I am not the struggles

Which caused them.

I am not the loneliness

Or regret or pain or anger or self-loathing or brokenness

That brought me to that point.

I am not the illnesses

Which plague my mind.

I am not the siren song

Of Depression

As it coaxes me

Into the blackened waters

That could be my grave.

I am not the incessant chorus

Of Anxiety

As more voices steadily join in

And fill the spaces in my mind with doubt.

I am not a hero

For remaining here today.

That was an accident.

I am just a lost soul

Trying to find its way

Despite misleading voices

Pushing and pulling me in all the wrong directions.

I am not a villain or a coward

For trying to escape.

I am just someone who has

Fallen to points of hopelessness

That seemed to cloak every aspect of life

In darkness.

I am simply learning

That to find light,

There are other places I may look

So long as I find it within myself

To continue searching.

These scars

Do not tell of the intricacies

Of my life.

They tell only of pain

And a desperation found

In the unknown

And that which is unable to be controlled.

Do not take them at their word.

They know but a fraction of the story.