Blue Eyes and Other Sources of Drowning

The Poem I Wished I'd Read at Sixteen

The poem I wish I would've read at sixteen is a long poem I would've skipped because it was too much or I couldn't relate to it.
It would be a poem about things I still don't believe but I hope if I repeated it enough I may start to. "You don't have to be skinny to be pretty." As if I didn't sleep in at 15 so I could only eat two meals a day, one of them being a single egg. As if I didn't have an app to calculator every calorie consumed and burned in exercise. I've stopped the apps, and eat three meals a day but some days I'm so disgusted by the fact that my stomach isn't flat that I can't think of anything else. High waisted pants and no crop tops are important wardrobe for me.
The poem I would've wanted to read at sixteen would be straight to the point. "You have mental illness." I'd beg younger me to listen to the possibility that crying herself to sleep every night was depression, and her inability to breath and focus before 4th period everyday for two years was anxiety. The days she felt euphoric all day and that she was going to do everything was the mania.
The poem I wish I read at sixteen would've warned me that a boy who was only nice to me, would eventually treat me like he treated everyone else. The words I read would've told me about how someone could say they loved you with the same lips that would manipulate my mind. Love cannot extinguish a heart full of fire. And neither can a nightly pillow of tears.
The poem I wish I read at sixteen will hopefully help someone else.