#depression poem
Sometimes I wish I were dead,
So I lay in bed
Staring blankly at the ceiling
Waiting for this feeling
To pass
-M
The world keeps spinning like it doesn’t even know it’s in pieces. And I am tired of tripping on the broken, getting caught up on the shattered promises. There are wishes under my feet, hopes crushed at the seams. Why is the sky still blue when it’s so dark inside my head? Why does the sun rise just to never touch me with warmth? I feel life laughing at me, I feel the weight of wreckage it dumps on my shoulders. I can’t continue to carry this chaos. The sorrow has settled in, there’s pain tucked into my skin. My universe is at a standstill, but no one else seems to notice. Life seems like a blur these days, all smudged lights, silhouettes meant for passing by. I suppose I have no choice but to face the ruin, masked with a faux smile; painted pretty, ready for pretending.
Isabel Cabrera
chaos is caged in my chest. misery runs through veins, guilt is growing in my lungs. there’s traces of ruin tangled in my hair, and wreckage wrapped around my wrists. i let the sorrows seep into my skin. crimson red painted on arms, blue running from heart to head. i bury myself into bruises, and count cuts like stars. a rattled soul, a walking worry scrambling to carry the weight of a world. i dream in dread, speak in heartbreak. my existence is a fog, a memory burning just to get lost in the smoke. there is no difference between night and day, both are stuck on midnight. i’m waiting for a sun rise. but hope has fallen from shaky hands, got trapped in truth. i won’t see the sun when i’m stuck in a sky without a moon.
There is a song in my mind, and she sings in sorrows. Some days it’s a quiet melody, a simple hum. Other days it’s a mess of words, a scream into silence. It’s a raging voice, reckless and ready to ruin me.
There is something within me that does not sleep, does not tire. An endless muscle working at wearing me down. A monster trapped between bones, gnawing and clawing. This voice in my head is disguised as my own, it whispers worthless words, wishes death upon my soul. I have no control. Pills down my throat, a razor to wrist, a scream into abyss, it’ll never be enough. It’s getting too big, taking up too much. There’s no space left for me, no room to heal or grow. I am a visitor in my own mind, a prisoner in my own shell. I’ve taken on a new meaning of personal hell.
I speak to the sky, hope that someone is there listening. I whisper to the wind, let secrets seep from my mouth; I hope they find a home in different bones. I stare at the sea, wonder if there’s some kind of monster out there bigger than the one in me. I shoot for the moon but find myself hanging by the stars, and the only wish I can muster up is for this rope to snap. Oh, this sadness nestled in my soul, this anger in my throat, a weight of a world I did not want to carry.. I crave to throw it all out. I tell myself there is always something bigger, something worse than the will and want to die. But in my head there lies a stranger, in the mirror a face without a name. I am so far gone, buried deep in the garden of sorrows, six feet under soil. I am caught in a constant state of night, living just to survive, breathing through the urge to die. Will I ever rid this ghost?
My bed feels more like a coffin these days. Holding this sleepless shell of mine, holding this heavy hollow heart. A body so empty of life, the warmth ripped out of my bones. My veins carry a shade of blue, painted from the sadness; strokes of red against my wrists. I am here, a haunting presence, a shadow of a soul, but I am also gone. A lost memory, a quiet voice faded and forgotten. I haven’t felt alive in awhile, I’ve been hidden in the dark, wandering outside the locked door. Too terrified to knock, too hesitant to ask for help. I watch from the window, who I am has drowned in the sorrows that sink my skin. My reflection might as well be a stranger, a face without a name, a story unheard. What is suppose to be my home might as well be a ghost town, a shelter broken and burning, we abandoned each other long ago.
when i look at people older than me, i often wonder how they made it here. how life didn’t swallow them whole. i study their faces like a map, i see the pools of weariness in their eyes. i see the way wrinkles dangle around their mouths, how the lines seep into their skin, little reminders of how long they’ve lived. i glide my eyes over their hands, the signs of growth and age splattered on their knuckles. i wonder about the stories they’ve gone through, i wonder if they were the protagonist or the antagonist. i wonder how they managed to wake up, to sleep, to exist through so many days and nights. i get overwhelmed. ican’t even fathom the thought of tomorrow, i can’t look at it with willing eyes, i can’t embrace it with open arms. instead, i dread it. i look at all the days i’ve lived, and they hang around my head, all the old memories, they haunt me. and so i wonder how they did it. i wonder how they’ll continue to do it, until death decides it’s time to take them. i wonder if i’ll ever get there. if i’ll ever look in the mirror, and the fine lines growing across my face will be normal, welcoming. i wonder if my days will be worth waking up for, if the thought of tomorrow will become a gift i’m lucky enough to receive. i can’t picture myself like that, aging, embracing. i can’t muster up a version of me with gray hair, and crepe skin. i’ve always thought i’d be gone too young, that this sadness would sink me into my grave before a wrinkle could settle into my fake smile. i’ve been convinced i won’t make it out of this battle alive; that this darkness is too strong, too thick to break through. i don’t know if i’ll ever be an old soul. but i do know i’ve been a drowning one. a lost one. a dying one.
