Certificate of Involuntary Admission by Myna Wallin

CW: Sectioning and Eating Disorders

Beneath my curly signature, I wrote thank you,

adding a flurry of small hearts.

Who does that?

I don’t remember anyone telling me

I was involuntary.

So grateful when the paramedics arrived, I cried.

They gave me my own room, with a twinkling

view like a New York condo.

But food like jail.

Better than starvation—marginally.

Made friends with a model, in love

with a man living in Egypt.

A collection of juice, food, in her room

but she rarely ate anything.

After learning she weighed 103,

she was defensive, at 5’ 7” she had to be thin.

Lithium dosages went up and up, my sleep went

from nothing at all to a handful of hours.

A handful of hours increased and increased.

I forgot

I ever signed a certificate of involuntary admission.

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Myna Wallin is a Toronto poet and prose writer. Her most recent collection is Anatomy of An Injury (Inanna Publications, 2018). Recent poems appeared in Juniper Poetry Journal, The Miramichi Reader, Vallum Magazine, The Quarantine Review and NōD Magazine. Myna has an M.A. in English Lit from University of Toronto. Twitter handle @Mynapoet.