Dear Prospective Rhi...

(This poem was written as homework from The Maudsley Hospital on 28th February 2022)

Dear prospective Rhi

What do you envisage your future to be?

Fast forward this tape recorder

To a life beyond the chains of your eating disorder.

The days are warm, and cinnamon coated –

Where lebkuchen biscuits are consumed without fears of becoming bloated.

Spontaneous trips to an authentic pizzeria,

Might help reverse my amenorrhoea.

Artichokes and olives waltz in harmony

Upon a sourdough floor –

Waking me from my fatal languor.

Immeasurable lattes might be devoured.

I will be empowered.

For right now,

A dirty chai

Will cry

For release,

From the past to peace.

“Another tea?”

No, let me hide in my soul’s debris.

I do not wish to be this Rhi.

In the future I will not count calories consumed,

As food will heal my enduring wound.

I wish to be ‘Little Rhi’,

Unbound and entirely free.

Stars will twinkle in the obsidian night;

A painting of relinquished plight.

My smile will not suppress dark dreams of sorrow,

But will sparkle in joy with the thought of tomorrow.

A family meal

Will be ethereal –

As I will fly from the crushing wheels of guilt and anxiety,

Able to feel satiety.

I will not wake hungry and tortured

With thoughts of grease-stained food,

During the night’s incessant solitude.

Instead, I will sleep until dawn

And live on

With strength for the day ahead -

With gingerbread

And books unread.

Sat in the office of a solicitor’s firm,

I will welcome those seeking asylum

With kindness and empathy,

For they survived journeys across the sea.

I will not feel agitated and weak,

For I wish to reverse the bleak

Monotones of imprisonment and evil.

For this, I will need human diesel.

I shall craft a new easel

Where these people can repaint futures

Of love and laughter,

Hereafter.

Hiking up waterfalls

Mountains

And roads,

Where joy explodes,

Will become a painless hobby once again;

Enchanting as finding the Goblin men

Hobbling down Rossetti’s glen.

My body will feel elated not sad,

And as I withdraw my sepia notepad,

I will record simple pleasure

To measure

My success

And progress.

A flat filled with books

Will echo poetry into she who cooks.

Aromas of spice will warm her soul,

Enabling her to fulfil the role

Of adoptive mother

To another

Little human,

Wrapped in cumin.

A dog will be present -

Fulfilled from walks

Across dawn kissed fields.

Lying by a fire, she yields

To dreams induced by fresh air

Elsewhere.

***

A relationship might be nice,

But for now, I must work on my internal price;

A value aside from numbers and scores -

One filled with open doors,

And a past placed in my chest of drawers.

I am the person I am today because of my illness,

But I am ready to escape the stillness

Of a life with anorexia.