thisis(not)thewayidie by Helena Pantsis

            This is not the way I die. I’ve seen it in the cards; in the stars; in the lines on my palm, with the gun at my head and the noose ‘round my neck — I can’t be scared, this is not my death. I’ve been here before, I live through it each time. With your hands on my throat, with the arrow in my eye. With the knife in my gut, with the pills down my throat. I’m not worried at all, this is not how I go.

            So lower your blade, chop me up limb from limb, watch me bleed til I’m empty, I’ve been here; I’ve lived. Man cannot stop me, he’s tried and he’s tried. His fists and his weapons, his games and his lies. So standing above me, at the dirt where I lie, make a list in your head and know this is not how I died.

____________________________________________________________

Helena Pantsis (18) is a student of psychology from Australia who occupies her free time dabbling in the art of writing with an affinity for darker themes of literature. She has been featured as an artist in the Body Without Organs international online literary journal.