Drained
When giving yourself is never enough...
Author’s Note & Content Warning
This poem was written after a series of exhausting medical appointments and bloodwork. It explores the physical and emotional toll of giving so much of yourself to the process of healing. It contains imagery of blood and self-harm, used metaphorically to convey exhaustion and cyclical struggle.
It told me
if I kept feeding it
pieces of me,
I’d receive all the answers
I seek.
So I emptied myself of my blood,
which it drank from a bejeweled chalice,
and it said,
“I’m not so sure.
Perhaps one more glass?”
Then I would retreat
to the dungeons
for attempted sleep.
What more could I do
than lie there
and wait
for my strength to rebuild?
And just when the days
regained their brightness,
when I thought about leaving,
I’d hear the bell ring.
“Let me feast
just once more night,” it would say.
“I’ll help you live deliciously.”
Then I’d grab a knife,
and begin the process
once again.