death to diagnosis - Dahlia Dandashi

Death to Diagnosis / 31

No one tells you how to be a sick girl.

So I killed off my diagnosis and decided to be be alive.

Being alive is sometimes enough!

Standing with a grocery bag almost as heavy

As a lifelong diagnosis

I think to myself

I am sick and tired of being sick.

I am alive just enough

To make nice with the chair I sit on once a week;

He likes me because of my ass, I think.

At least the needle reminds me of what it is

To be dizzy with goosebumps, like the first kiss

But instead of your lips

Parting afterwards

You keep melting into your grave.

When the owner of Bedford Gourmet Deli

Finally comes to ask

“What are you waiting for?” I say

For someone to sing me a lie

Or for some control

That

Or for the pound of flesh I am owed.