Content warning for mental illness and depression

 

It is an ill fate to survive the unsurvivable

 

Your own mind swarm

stinging you like wasps

that should have turned to figs

 

Even the good days shallow your breath

You run to the top of Mount Everest

just to freeze in the same place you

begged to get to

 

Some days you wish life would just take you

Most days you’re surprised that it hasn’t

This does not mean it has not tried to

This does not mean

Your jaw has not latched itself onto prescription pill bottles

This does not mean

That you have not survived your own blades and fists

This does not mean

Your days are not spent on auto-pilot

not sinking its claws further into your flesh

 

Fear trickles like floods

 

At first when you crafted swords with words

you saw potential

steps formed of clay notches

handholds up through red dirt

transforming blueprint dreams

for star-sky mornings

 

But you thought of walls tumbling down

dirt stifling cries

so when prayed-for

precipitation arced down in torrents

downed arches tread muck-drowned

 

One thing remained

a faint rain

bowed outline bones

residues of smiling faces

bodies removed

fossil remain

 

Giving all you have to surviving

means there’s not much else to give

Depression is refilling what

will constantly be empty

A frigid, deafening gap

The Bermuda Triangle lives inside of you

 

But

you cannot survive the unsurvivable

and be anything less than strong

 

Your mind collects trinkets of memories

You eventually learn how to keep yourself warm.

You eventually learn that learning warmth is not

the kindling that will set you on fire

 

The deep still lives inside of you

sometimes it threatens to drown you

sometimes surviving is building a boat until your hands are bloody

other times, it’s a light drizzle. A reminder.

Other times, it’s the clouds gathering over sunlight

the wind kissing warmth onto your skin

 

Other times, it’s closing the window

against the rain