starvation for existence

it's here again.

2:40 a.m. i flip on my light and sit up. the raw, primal emptiness echoes through my stomach. i'm still hungry. i clumsily rustle through my drawers, fingers feeling for the rough cover of my bible. ah, there it is. my beacon of hope, the root of my salvation. my deliverance.

this is not the holy bible.

the pages of my book are worn, worn from the 200,000 times my fingers have frantically turned the pages searching for any form of fortitude. my body aches from the miles run, my chest still burns from each pounding step. my discipline grows with each inch conquered.

another pang hits my stomach. the faces of the most beautiful people in the world stare back at me. i am taunted by their eyes, lips, hands, legs, hips, breasts, hair. for a moment the seething self-hate returns to incessantly pinch my skin, the skin on my back, legs, arms, stomach, cheeks. and then it slowly fades, and my images of inspiration drive me once more.

i read the quotes scrawled out frantically in other moments of weakness.

your body is a perception of you. it shows your discipline, courage, and strength.

nothing tastes as good as thin feels.

hunger is an emotion. you can control your emotions.

desperate times call for desperate restriction.

them.

that one word does it, if nothing else will. "them". it could mean anybody...yet it means everybody. everybody i wish could see me now. everybody who does see me now, but still dont see me at all. everybody who will crave to see me when this is through, want me, desire me. love me. everybody i wish that i could see, but are too far away. or gone.

them.


the growling in my cavernous stomach subsides. the aching hunger that my body feels ebbs, or does not ebb--simply sits quietly, waiting for another opportune moment of weakness. i close my bible, my book of shadows, my sutras, and set it back in its drawer.



i starve to be known. i starve to be wanted. i starve for existence.