Published poetry that contains references to self-injury or is about self-injury or a self-injurer.
If you're looking for poems about self-injury that have been contributed to the site or are looking to contribute poetry to the site go to Creativity -- Poetry.
Poem about a man who picks up a book in a bargain bin and recognized the author as somebody he used to know.
An excerpt but it's not the only reference to self-injury in the poem:
[...] not
the name I knew her by twenty years ago, the one
she'd give to herself, not a name really but an assault
on her name, an activity spelled out in scars
across her stomach and down her thighs, not imperfections
of skin as first I'd thought, not anything at my age then
I could imagine or easily comprehend or not doubt
except when she said how only recently she'd stopped
cutting herself. "I'm a bleeder," she said. And that's
the name I've thought of through the years when
I've thought of her. The razor made her feel
both better and worse about herself. "Worse," she said,
because you could not respect the inch of suicide each slash
defined and "better" because at least you'd done something
This is a prose poem that goes through all those behaviors we do that we know are good for us, beginning small and then progressing.
The close of the poem:
[...] it's like waiting all year for your birthday, and when it finally comes, insisting on staying home, it's like that night, turning twenty-five in the garage, sitting on top of the dryer with a bobby pin between your fingers, biting off the soft part, spitting it out, letting the phone ring and ring, because all you want to do is this, just this.
The entire poem is about a self-injurer, first beginning with references to Plath's "Cut" (which is not about self-injury and the poet does not imply it is). It is told from an outside perspective ("we"). It covers her relationship with her father, her disintegration, and then her end.
Sample:
"Postscript.
Sometimes she would cut herself, then go next door
to the neighbor's house --
a drywall finisher out of work
because this was the recession --
and present her arms to him
shyly, like a girl
in her first prom gown of ruched sateen,
awkward in bows
but with terribly alert eyes."
There are more quotes in the Quotes section under Media & Popular Culture.
Popular Culture - Poem published by Gabrielle 2 years ago ()
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Welcome!
My name is Gabrielle and I am twenty-eight years old. I began to self-injure at age fifteen -- so nearly thirteen years -- minus a two year period. This website was made to let self-injurers know that they are not alone and to help their friends and family learn more about self-injury and how it affects their loved one.
