ugly waters
i guess
i never thought
i could be this much
we could be this much
you see,
there's more than lies,
more that lies
under passive waters
where all the colors
of the eyes of the oceans
have been bled out
and we're all just an expanse of gray
i like to tread carefully
but sometimes i
take the dive
and i choke, sputter,
but pain gives way to
that Something more
and you are something more
we are something more
if we only accept it
if we only accept it
here in the deep
where don't get me wrong, it's dark
it's like nighttime is squeezing my soul
but then i see you
and i see there's others down here
as you cry to the counselor
and we scream that none of us are heard
but maybe we can
hear each other
and i think i hear you
where water fills my ears
i hear you
through the ink-stained waves
and suddenly it's all teal and beautiful
snowball
glances whispers rumors spark feelings without names igniting icy rage tinted jealous jarred thoughts unglued scattered lacking sentence structure because my mind has no lines no boundaries no control when wandering wanders too far i can’t retrieve the wanderers from the wilderness so i weep for the nameless soldiers of the war within the battles beneath breasts behind smiles masking chaos at its snowcapped peak cracking sliding an avalanche of aimless agony burying the excess emotions undesirable and ugly for no eyes but His and even those glint suspicious with partiality unspoken prejudice unrevealed instead put away privately but sensed and unraveled at the battlegrounds now a graveyard littered with death but bursting with new life choking out the mundane existence until the mundane departs and superficial standards still stand they still stand they still stand i can’t stand it any longer
my friend
i have been under the impression
that the bright places belong to me
that being a bright place was for me, only me
but now i have a hallway light
to chase the nightmares from my bedroom
and bring the colour back to my walls
and i can once again make out
all the milk tea cans i’ve collected
when i realize that you're in the next room
in the pitch black
feeling consumed, chewed and swallowed
into the belly of depression
i'd like to be your eyes
to be a little bright spot in your dark, dark world
i think i found some bright places
so i could be a bright place
for you, maybe more than me
unit seven
a home in which hair ties are hazards
here i learn the scrutiny of
fluorescent lights
on every scab
every square inch of skin that
ordinarily stays a secret
only known to myself and my razorblade
now
i’m watching old movies with new strangers
and spotting tree frogs on the windows
ten minute phone calls
and two tshirts for the week
i don’t remember what time it is,
not even what day
quite frankly
i don’t know where i am exactly
or why i am wherever i am
or who is holding this blue marker
and hoping Mrs. Maribel won’t take it
before i finish this poem
but i’ll be okay
i’m just gonna go sit a while
with other sick people
and let myself laugh
for a time
good? morning
mornings
have always been
for procrastinating being alive
listening to sad songs
to start the day
just in case i forgot who i was
while i was sleeping
mornings mean
watching the sun
set fire to the pictures of violence
littering my twin bedsheets
from the night
i yawn and stretch my shoulders
in the dull heat of the flames
every morning
when i wave hello to my walls again
darkness clings to me
it clings to me
like dust clings to old sweaters
like viruses cling to young bodies
and it is heavy,
this darkness
this morning,
the demons complimented
my music taste
and i cut my wired headphones
with purple scissors
every morning,
and every moment
between mornings,
i am standing on a battlefield
with a ballpoint pen between my fingers
and in the soft flesh of my belly
i inscribe poems
telling myself, i'm winning! i'm winning!
but i'm just bleeding
this morning
i realize
i've married myself to darkness
and called it a coping mechanism
this morning
and the last
i have prayed for light
but it is difficult to know
if the sun is rising or falling
(am i finally winning?
was it ever mine to win?)
this morning
i feel bloated with questions
and prayers that i don't want to pray
and unfinished poems
to scribble onto sketchbook pages
instead of skin
i yawn
and i stretch
and i brush my hair
and i pray anyways
for Light
because i want to understand what it's like to see
and to win
and to dream in colors that aren't red
and to dance
and to be alive again
i pray in poetry
and sometimes in no words at all
but still i pray
because this morning
there is nothing else left for me to do
haylee: psych ward poetry (iii)
wherever haylee goes,
butterflies follow.
purple wings
to remind her that things
won’t always be this way.
they flutter behind her
as she paces the floor
and settle in her curls
which she wishes would uncurl.
when haylee smiles,
monarchs escape her mouth
and dance through the gaps in the courtyard fence
which she wishes would fall.
she wishes, and sometimes she wonders
if it’s even worth it.
but then she smiles
and the butterflies that kiss her freckled face
remind her that it is.
it’s worth it;
she is worth it.
jo: psych ward poetry (ii)
this morning
there’s this buzz in the dayroom
other than the ordinary fluorescent hum
and not the cicadas in the courtyard
but more an anticipation
buzzing
through thirteen young, scarred bodies
there’s a new smile to return
new hands and new art and new words
and it’s all buzzing, buzzing with energy
that is golden yellow
and called jo.
jo has glass shards
in her smile
but they don’t cut when she laughs
instead, they reflect light
and she shines
kaitie: psych ward poetry (i)
kaitie combs her hair quietly;
it’s not so quiet in her head
no, it’s loud
like the ocean waves
as they shatter against the shoreline
she swallows pills to flush the crabs from her bones
but still they scuttle
where she wishes instead flowers would grow
one day
kaitie‘s gonna wake up
and smell springtime
instead of salt
daisies and roses and sunflowers and
poppies and dandelions
and she will flash her braces to the blue sky and know
she is alive!
secret garden
when the moon becomes full
my body becomes a garden of flowers
colorless shapes of petals in the dark
blooming across my ribs, my hips
i watch the petals breathe, in all their violet carnage
and wish i would breathe no more
when the sun wakes up
i‘ll get up, and watch the petals fall from my frame
settle into my cemetery of a bedroom floor
i collect corpses of flowers
and photographs that don’t belong to me
my father is allergic to flowers
i think that’s why he doesn’t come say goodnight anymore
it’s just me and the strangers taped to my walls
and all the flowers i watch blossom and die every night
wishing i would die with them
but i don’t
it is a painful, painful existence
please don’t take my sunshine away
i can picture you pacing the paint swatch aisle
packing your pockets
with colours that remind you of the
girl i used to be
bright girl, i was called
what would you call me now?
i could bare my yellow teeth at the world
but there's no longer sunshine in my smile
no, my teeth are yellow like
piano keys that stick
yellow like the pollen on our windows,
in our lungs
when i smile
cigarette smoke escapes between my teeth
you choke on the wordless air between us
but i keep smiling
what if i stopped?
what if i let my cracking lips close around my teeth?
what then?
i suppose i might never smile again
tell me, would you sigh with relief?
step back and breathe
the air would no longer taste like me
i like to think it'd be sweet
i hope it doesn't make you think of me
like the colour yellow makes me think of you
and the sunshine girl i buried two summers ago
the daughter you still grieve
every time you get a glimpse of my yellow teeth