"Food.

Exercise.

Starvation.

A fascination with bones,

body feeling.

Anxiety.

Depression.

Obsession.

Avoiding friends,

family,

myself.

A yearning for emptiness,

a fear of being full.

Being full of emptiness.

It wasn’t until much later – about four years after I started to recover from my eating disorder – that I realized how it had been infiltrating my poetry all along. After all, in my writing, I could be honest to my experiences, whether or not they made sense.

There’s this quote about poetry, that it “heals the wounds infected by reason.” but this collection is me recognizing, relinquishing, and releasing the wounds that developed without reason, or for reasons that have no reason. Why would anyone starve themselves, anyway? Why would anyone find satisfaction in getting skinny enough just to see a clavicle jut out of a shoulder? Why would anyone compromise a social life just to maintain the daily calorie count?

While poetry may be a rest from logic and a way to reason the illogical, it is important to acknowledge what it is that you are experiencing. Looking at your poetry, what it is that your mind does, subconsciously – can help you realize who you are, what you want, what madness you are perpetuating in and onto yourself."