When I say “I long to be Damaged” I mean, way out of the Ordinary

I command this body to lose luster,
for me to be tainted with wrath.
punishment that I am— dismantling empathy in vows, to harbor a lesser pain.
answerable to only the pleasure of my aching.

I am boundless with dark grief.
you’d know how my woe torches,
how my sorrow laps flame:

a reddish resistance towards whatever twirls supplication into sore throat,
dragging my mutant breath, till my ducts are slacked.

I bear my deadliest darkness like a reliquary.
a bright agony knives my collarbone.

in your spare time, say a prayer for this ruin,
this relic, this rare accident of mud & breath,
knocked down by the craze of living.

I too own my wound in the elegance of a long stain.
here, the stretchmark. here, the hurt shaped into a ligature—
the way ache cling onto the body, the body onto ache.

I tarnish my skin to mold blisters.
if this cost me damage, I consent to the torment that is my upbringing.

I’ve guarded this suffering my whole life.
this body shouldn’t be a yardstick for misfortune.

won’t you pardon me, if I say
I lack the fire to lamp my way through the next minute?