I am more than the shallow breaths that escape my aching lungs, billowing up in a little white puff against the chilly, moonlit night. I am more than the weight you’ve forced me to carry on my shoulders. I am more than the distant, far-off look in my empty eyes. I am more than the bones you cracked in anger or bruised for the fun of it. I am more than the blood you spilled, for I have turned all that pain into something different. Something you can never touch.

I have turned my blood into ink. It slides down my skin like a caress. It flows in my veins and coats my insides like body armor. And it makes my mind come alive like you never could.

© Sarah Doughty

Image courtesy of Laura Makabresku

Sarah Doughty is the tingling wonder-voice behind Heartstring Eulogies. She’s also the author of The Silence…

Hi, I’m Sherron, from the South, and I am a bookaholic.

I currently have my dream job, which is freelance editing. —More to read!

My mother is also an avid reader like me so we’ve always shared books back and forth. Now with the digital age we share a nook account. Works out great. She buys some, I buy some, and we both get to read without mailing the books to each other.

Recently, I was trying to get into the B&N account to add a couple of books to our library. My password didn’t work. Repeatedly. I can’t change it because they wanted to email something to my mother’s email.

I remember she’d recently had a complete computer apocalypse, and had been forced to change some passwords that only the old computer had known. I thought maybe B&N was one of them.

I email; she sends the password. Funny…

“Survival runs
in our blood.”

We are
the descendants
of people
too cunning
to die in a pyre.
They knew
how to survive.
And their magic
flows through
our veins.

© Sarah Doughty