Give Me Some Skin

External protection
Breathing absorbing
Alive while dying
Flaking cellular debris

Battle scarred
Badge of honor
Thinly layered thick

Decorated memory filled
Pinched, pricked, stitched

Sagging folds stretch
Diverse pigmented coats
Weeping salted waste
Sheltering foreign hosts

Sensitive to the touch
Calloused for the cause
Hair raising, fever chilled
Dirty, washed

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Learning to be happy within your own skin can take a lifetime. To expose to others the very essence that cloaks our soul. Vulnerable, as it is laid bare for all to see.

We look to belong, while yearning to be free. From judgement, from damnation, and from ourselves. I want not to fear, yet I do. Can I face that fear? Can you?

Why is it, the closer to death I am, the more alive I feel?