Mosaics

I stand behind the portrait I made of myself, mosaic tiles set in cement, intended to be something grand, something permanent. Before me I stand tall, I stand strong, thin, clad in armor of white and blue and gold, short golden locks pulled back as curls break free. My chest is held out, my jaw set and proud, the blue in my eye pale and fierce. I’m fearless, carrying a sword of justice, riches piled at my feet as I live a life of purity, of ambition, defeating every shadow of evil that crosses my path.

I raise a hammer and slam into it, lengthening the cracks that have been showing the past half decade, ruining the perfection of it. My red, half shaven hair is pulled back as curls encumber my vision, darker, deeper blue eyes that I wear proud set in determination to destroy this. All of this.

I slam at the tiles of riches that remind me of my ex-fathers greed, that reminds me of my entitlement, of my misplaced, fragile pride, until they’re falling out of their setting and the cement starts to chip. The armor I thought I wore must have been aluminum for how easily it had been dented, for how it started to break and fall off of me, leaving me exposed before I was ready but oh, did I need it removed.

I dig my fingers in, not minding how they scrape and sting, to tear out the golden curls that were worshiped by the same people who adored me as a servant to their wills. I spit in the pale of my mosaic eyes, what I saw when I looked for the light too much and I bleached my own color. I replace the sword I carry with the impact of my hammer – I have lied, I have used, I have manipulated and stolen and failed, and I am no better than the people I looked down upon, that I told myself I was better than, that I learned were evil and should be imprisoned and reformed and purged.

I disfigure the slim waist I had set for myself, that I had envisioned, that I had strived and starved towards, as if I had never struggled through addiction, as if I could remove my depression, as if I had never been ill. I destroy the image I had created for myself in my blindness, in my need to be something better in a home where I was told I was lesser.

My weight is slammed behind every swing of the hammer, my skin red and splotched and imperfect in the face of what I had hoped one day would be a mirror, my pockets empty in front of a mural that flaunted its gold. I was going to be a knight, a user of light, I was going to purge myself of trauma so I could be pure of thought, pure of intention. I’d bleach myself from the inside out until I was flawless. I was so willing to be destroyed in the name of becoming someone I was proud of, someone perfect, someone that people could be proud of. No longer the misanthropic, ****** fat girl that couldn’t make her father happy.

I’ll leave this nothing but glass to be recycled and concrete to be broken. I’ll put up a mirror, one that reflects in real time, one that shows scars as they come and go, one that show’s my weight in all it’s trauma-laden glory, one that shows stubborn eyes and break outs and malicious intents and all the love my heart can hold. I’m tired of breaking myself for the sake of perfection, for the sake of others, for the sake of potential, for the sake of the hero I thought I needed myself to be, for myself to survive, to live. I don’t know what I am anymore, if I’m a hero, a villain or something in between. All I know is that I’m me, that I’m becoming who I want to be, while accepting everything I never wanted. Every vile thought, every violent impulse, every sharp temper, the need to cut and run and hide, the need to pursue and grasp and love even harder. I am the need to flee, the need to cling, I am passion, I am depression, and I’ll cut anyone else who tells me otherwise at the knees.

I am so more than what I planned to be. I am alive, and that could never be contained.