Taste for blood

I’m not a badass bitch.
I’m a warrior and a survivor, 

I’m a goddess and a caregiver.

I turn my pain into 

whatever I have to turn it into, 

to push through.

I am there for the people I love

and I rise again and again 

to help those, 

that just need a little kindness.

I am tired, I am bleeding out,

I’m irrevocably scarred.

I don’t want to just survive, 

I don’t want to have to keep

picking up my sword.

I keep taking hit after hit,

I’m getting a taste for my own blood.

I feel my bones breaking,

and my psyche and soul shattering.

This isn’t rock bottom,

this is six feet under.

I’m not living, I’m coping. 

and I don’t know 

how much longer

the taste of my own blood 

will save me.

I am becoming a monster.

I am becoming dangerous.

I am breathing fire.

If I don’t fall apart and die,

I may develop a taste

for someone else’s blood.

I need to live,

and I don’t remember how.