When I was a little Cub Scout
I was taught to handle knives with care
Stay safe while using them
Only use them when permitted

When I was a little Cub Scout
I thought all of this was redundant
Common sense anyone should know
Because who would ever put themself in harm's way?

When I was a little Cub Scout
I didn't quite grasp depression
People who whittle down things
Other than soap bars and sticks

But when I was a Boy Scout
With my very first knife in my hands
And my very first cut on my arm
I understood why these rules were set.

When I was a Boy Scout
That first cut was accidental
But yet something stuck with me
A wandering thought found its home in my head

When I was a Boy Scout
The cuts became less and less accidental
An addiction growing onto me
A desire to feel something

The puffy white clouds
The clear blue sky
The laughing friends all around
The crisp spring air

Heartbreak doesn't wait
For stormy days and windy nights.

Heartbreak is ironic.
It can happen at any time
From the brightest, happiest day
To the stormiest, darkest days.
And when you're blinded by the brightness of day
It becomes a little harder
To pick up the pieces

And in the moment
You realize that you are in your own bubble
Your worst day could be someone else's best
And in that moment, you are alone.

Think of a monster.
Now why is it a monster?

Is it the looks?
Twisted teeth, Pointy horns,
Broadened chest, body of thorns?

The personality?
Sketchy, Judgemental, Manipulative,
A betraying spirit that doesn't forgive?

But I can guarantee that some people here
Didn't imagine anything fictional
Maybe it was a father, a mother?
A backstabbing friend?
A brother, a sister?
A manipulative boy or girlfriend?

These monsters are real
And these people just the victims
Of a living nightmare.

Listen, I'm fine if you tell them,
Every single thing I did to you,
As long as you also tell them
Every single thing you did to me.

Every single time you led me on,
Every single secret of mine you shared,
Every single promise you broke.
Every. Single. Thing.

They say it’s better to have loved and lost
Than to have never loved at all.

Is that really true?
Is it true if that love mentally destroyed you?

Most nights I'm up till two, three, four
Wondering where I'll be
In ten, fifteen, twenty years
But some nights
I wonder if I'll make it that far

It's always the straw that breaks the camel's back
That straw is always the most memorable of them

But where would that straw be,
If not for any of the other beautiful little flaws?

Love could be labeled as a poison
And people would still drink it.

Every day, in my mind,
A battle between light and dark ensues
My light, My innocence,
My values and resilience.

None of that was light enough
For the shadows of my past
The plaguing regret,
The guilt, shame and defeat

Backed into a corner,
With nowhere else to go
Almost defeated by my own self
Ready to throw the towel in

But you came along,
You beautiful Ray of golden sun!
You see my flickering light and nurture it
I am not alone in this.

A free trial for suicide
Imagine how nice that'd be.

You'd be able to see
The next 24 hours
How they'd react to the news
If they'd react at all.

Imagine being able to see every cut caused,
Every rumor spread,
Every other suicide,
Caused by your own.

But imagine seeing
That nobody cared
Nobody's life would have been any different
At least it'd give you some closure.

And from there
You'd be able to decide
Is suicide really worth it?

Driving down the highway
The rain is pouring
The traffic is building
The drops pitter patter on the rooftop

But ahead
A bridge
If I reach it
I’ll be fine

Under it’s calmer
As I wait beneath this cover
It’s almost peaceful
It’s almost silent

But, Alas
The traffic will clear
And I’ll have to leave
The bridge that brought me peace

And as the wheels leave
The solace of the bridge
The rain hits
A little harder now

It’s all louder than it was before
More chaotic
More painful
The rain booms now all around

One cut, two cut, three cut, four!
The raccoons are back once more,
So let me see what I have in store.

Five cut, six cut, seven cut, eight!
Who do they appreciate?
Just as long as he's not late?

Nine cut, ten cut, 'leven cut, twelve
How much further will we delve
Another bottle of liquor comes of the shelve

I can no longer count the lines I've made
These little boys I've never betrayed
They're the only ones who've stayed

Crimson for company, just you and me
Let's go on and spill the tea
As you hop and shout in glee!

And as I pass out, falling on the floor
You want more than ever before
I just have a little more, I'm sure

And when I am finally drained
Look back at all that you've gained
It becomes me that you've disdained.

You can't save everyone.
It's as simple as that.
Not all stories have happy endings
Or redemption arcs
They just end
As much as you think you can
As much as you feel it's necessary to help them
Their survival is not guaranteed.
And, believe me,
Trying to save someone else
Means giving up part of yourself.
Do this enough, there will be no more 'yourself'
You may think it'll be worth it
But there's only so much you can do
Before you destroy yourself

A cutting friend introduced me to the practice.
I tried all I could and it drained me.
They left my life none the better
And I left theirs all the worse.

Don't push yourself too far, is what I'm saying.
Some things are just futile.

I always knew there'd be times
Where I'd cry one day
Look back a while later and laugh.

But I never knew there'd be a time
Where I'd laugh one day,
Look back later and cry.

Thorns 'round my heart
And this weight on my soul
One day I last longer
One day I lose control

Draining my energy
Till I'm left lying
On the bed for hours
I shouldn't be trying

To hold on to anyone else
Is to lose a part of myself
'Cause in the end they all leave me
Just an empty bottle on the shelf

And through everyone that's left
I can call this silver blade my friend
A temporary distraction
'Til I reach my very end

I want people to care
Lemme tell you, I do
But everyone'll just pass me by
And I don't doubt even you

Will someday be another one
That I let see me down
But instead of helping you packed your bags
And walked out of my town

Unable to scream,
Unable to fight
Time for me to give up
I've used up all of my might

These vines growing stronger
Keeping me all *******
My will to go on further
You've taken from my cup

Getting over about someone you care about.
It's a lot easier when you don't see them.
But it gets hard keeping your chin up, keeping your posture up,
When you see them every single **** day.

It gets really hard,
Let me tell you.
Seeing someone you used to love so much
Now just a stranger

I used to tell them all of my victories
And now, I'm just stuck
Keeping it all to myself
Because nobody cared as much as you had

But you're gone and I can't do much about it,
I guess I'll just try to get over them.

Love is like a minor form of Quantum Entanglement.
You’re bound to the other person
Emotionally, Mentally, Spiritually.

Your wins are their wins
Their losses are your losses
Pain they have is yours as well.

And it’s scary,
You could be doing fine
Until the ding on your phone

Something could happen to them
That destroys you.
They could have that power.

The blade glistens in the bright moonlight
As I sit in my tent in the woods
Alone.

Through my boredom a wandering raccoon comes along
A desire
A thought
An urge

I shrug it off for now,
tossing the blade from hand to hand
The raccoon grows louder
Tying me down in my own mind

All that I’m thinking of is the blade,
My skin
And the crimson red hiding behind
It wouldn’t take much to reach it
It wants the crimson.

The blade is sharp
Waiting
Begging
The thoughts drown out all common sense

Until the blade is on my wrist
Resting
Apply some pressure
I feel it
A tingling through my arm
As I drag the blade across my skin
Crimson red pouring out
The raccoon is euphoric.

The pain overpowers those thoughts
Quiets the din of the raccoons
But my friend,
Pain is only a temporary experience.
They come back.
Wild raccoons given a taste of power
Coming back.

They louden
I give in
They quiet down
Rinse
Repeat.

Parallel lines down my left arm
Out of room
Try my other arm
The blade’s easy to hold in my numb left arm
As I mirror the cuts over to the right

I’ve given it all that I could.
Yet it comes back again
It wants more
It wants more

I give it more
They're are satisfied for now
Toss on a long-sleeved shirt
Long jeans.
Nobody’ll be able to tell
Of the things that I’ve done
for a raccoon

Until it asks for more.

From talking for six hours at a time
To six minutes
To six messages
To six words
To six days ago

What happened?

Depression is like
Taste buds slowly being ripped from my mouth
A weird feeling that anything I eat
Doesn't make it to my stomach, but,
I've gotta keep eating, I have to eat to live,
But preparing the food is just so much effort
For so little payoff.
Because it'll all just kinda taste like mashed potatoes.

I'll still be hungry afterwards
So why bother with seasonings?
Why bother with ingredients I used to like?
I can't taste them, I can't feel them in my stomach.
They just taste like plain mashed potatoes.
Why do I even eat?

I'm hungry.
I'm sick of the taste
Of mashed potatoes.
Why is this happening?

I'm sorry for being selfish
Sorry for prolonging your suffering

I'll let you take your life.
For peace to finally settle in your heavy heart

Because I guess I now realize
Suicide isn't about not wanting to live.
It's simply about not wanting to feel pain.

So it would be extremely selfish of me
To prolong that pain.
The peace in your bones
Would be greater than the pain in my heart.

I think I love her.
She's got beautiful eyes
And a great, little giggle
Her hair's a wavy, golden splendor
And whenever we're talking,
It just feels right.

I want to tell her this all
So why do I wait?
I don't have the right words.
I think she'll reject me.
Love has hurt me 3 times before,
So why expect anything different?

It would be so easy
To just text her, to just tell her
"Hey, I love you."
But I can't. I can't say it.

She won't like the real me.
The me with problems.
She won't like Blake,
Or how he takes over when nobody's around.
She's not ready for all the problems I'd bring.

But...
Maybe if I wait longer
Talk to her more often
Give that a couple weeks
And then take my shot.

But again...
I don't want to hurt her.
I don't want her to hurt me.
She's just so...
Precious. Innocent. Pure.
And I'm...
A mess, A wreck, So many problems

A war within my own mind
And I'm not sure who's winning.

Do you remember,
The first time someone called you a name or an ugly word?
How it wormed its way inside your head,
Like a maggot?

Nobody mentions how sometimes,
That maggot never goes away.
How it grows and grows,
Into a demon.

Nobody mentions the screams that bounce around in your head,
Pointing out every flaw and imperfection.
Nobody mentions the way silence feels like poison,
Thick and burning every inch of you.

How loneliness is like a hot iron,
Being pressed all over your skin.
They never tell you what it's like.

Nobody mentions how odd your fingers feel,
Shoved down your throat for the first time.
How it feels to be knelt over the toilet,
Forcing yourself to ***** your entire last meal.
For every meal.

Nobody mentions how you'll feel like you're on a podium,
Everyone freely seeing, freely judging every imperfection.
How they can point out every extra pound, stretch mark and scar
With perfect eyesight, perfect accuracy.

Nobody mentions how even doing things like feeding yourself,
Become chores.
Or the sound of your own retching, or anyone else's, for that matter, Echoing around the bathroom, akin to a gunshot.

Nobody mentions how it feels to cut for the first time,
Or the second, or the third.
How the blood will drip down your arm,
If you go deep enough

Or how addicted to it you can become,
Like it's some sort of lifeline, when, really,
With each cut you make and each blade you use,
You're losing time, you're losing yourself.

Nobody mentions how it feels to sit in your room, alone,
On the edge of your bed, on the edge of suicide.
How it feels to wonder if you matter.

Nobody mentions the way it builds, tight in your chest,
Like someone's taken a rope around your lungs,
Pulling tighter, and tighter, and tighter
With every second you still question everything,
Every second you're still breathing.

Nobody mentions the weight of the pills,
Once they're in your hand.
They hold your entire unexplored future.
It's no wonder they feel so heavy.

Nobody mentions the way it feels to go to sleep,
As if it is the last, wondering,
Will you make it to tomorrow morning?
Praying you just don't.

And Nobody mentions the soul crushing despair,
The disappointment when you open your eyes the next day.

Honestly, I'd take a bullet for anyone.
At least it'd come with the closure of saving a life,
No matter which life it is.

Or maybe push someone away from a bus or oncoming car
Maybe take up firefighting or join the police force
Take on people thrice my size to let someone else away
Put myself in whatever danger's way to save others

And that's the thing about me.
I don't value my life. My life means nothing if I'm not saving others.
I'd trade my life to anyone in need, cause odds are,
They value theirs more than I value mine.

One day I hope I'll be able to step up in one of these ways
Because dead men share no intents.
They'd call the intents heroic and selfless
While I know the intents as suicidal and selfish.

If I were to die tonight
Everyone would miss me
Say how much they cared about me
Say they couldn't believe it happened to me

But really, where were you all six months ago?
Or even six hours ago?
I don't exactly hide my feelings well.
Cries for help are ignored all the time.

If you didn't care about me then,
Why the hell do you care about me now?
You could have done something to help!
Anything!

People don't understand the power
Of three simple words
"Are you okay?"
Nobody does.

You all would care for a week
If not less than that
And then immediately go back
I'd get forgotten again.

The sad part is,
It's five words
And so many people know
Just what I'm talking about.

As I stand in the bathroom
In front of the mirror
I meet my own eyes
And look hard

I’ve changed.
I’m not the me I once thought I was
But, really
Who did I think I was before?

Small details on my face
Changes in my tone
They weren’t there last time I checked
Who am I?

I used to be
The Bleach-Blond Haired
The sparkly-blue eyed kid
Not even those traits held true to me.

I hold out my arms in front of me
They’re larger than I remember
My face looks older
My eyes look tired

What is my identity?
How could I answer that?
You could ask me
For any of my favorite things

I’d give you an answer
That isn’t my own
But one I picked up
From someone else

I absorb others’ dialects
Their likes
Their dislikes
And the saddest part?

I don’t even know
Who I am
Without their answers
I don’t know

Who I was once
When I truly lived
For myself.
I don’t know anymore.

Will I ever find out who I was
Who I am
Who I will be
On my own?

I'm not okay
I smile anyways.
Too sad to say
Maybe today

Plans that we made
Can't go, I'm afraid
At home with my blade
On my bed I laid

Knife crimson in hand
I don't understand
My hourglass' sand
On top, still quite grand.

When will it stop?
My blood I have to mop
As my heart will drop
Back to my bed I flop

And leaf subsides to leaf
The Great Happiness Thief
As I sank to Grief
The feeling no longer brief.

I'm not okay.

He's a parasite
A plague in my mind
Something I hardly noticed at first
I tried to help him

His successes were my successes
His problems were my problems
His depression became my depression
I became him

I helped him, I think
But at what cost of my own?
My life revolving around his
He was priority number 1

Grades slipped
Sleep schedule slipped
Trust slipped
Social life slipped

And all the while
Everything was slipping away
I held onto him
Longer than I should have

But by the time he left
He had planted a seed in my mind
A sapling of suicidal thoughts
Sprouting to a beautiful tree

Knitted with knives
Decorated with drugs
Stuffed with starvation
Loaded with lighters

A fruitful product
Hopefully it'll die out soon
Maybe it won't
Maybe I'll be first.

I was told to write out my feelings
On a piece of white paper

But as I sit here
Half an hour later
It’s empty,

And honestly,
I couldn’t have said it better.

The sounds of an autumn forest, the chirping of the birds,
The swaying of the leaves, The crackling leaves and sticks
On the soft dirt ground. The smells of the crisp autumn air,
Even a few deer calmly sipping at a lake. It all joins together
To create an image, a tranquil scene. Everything in its place.

But in comes the hunters with guns loaded, blood in their eyes
As they take aim, they instead fill the air with a smell
The scent of lead bullets and smoke and blood overwhelms
The sound of pops and thuds as the landscape slowly ruins
Nothing but corpses and hunters left.

They pack up their game and leave, the scene still a mess
They’ve got what they wanted, so why should it matter
If the forest sustains damage, they wouldn’t care.
Sometimes people can be hunters to others’ forests
Coming in, disrupting the harmony for their own benefit
And Leaving the scene one of discord.

When I was eight,
I thought I'd be the happiest soul out there
I was smart and funny and athletic
Everyone loved me

When I was ten,
I had the most friends out of everyone
I wouldn't let a speech impediment stop me
I had an amazing poetry class
(Maybe that's why I love this site more than I love myself)

When I was twelve,
I had a smaller, closer group of friends
I had a girlfriend that I had loved
And grades to boast about

When I was fourteen,
I didn't have many friends. I had a new girlfriend
At least I did good in all of my classes still.
I was confused to hear that people were depressed

And now, now that I'm fifteen? Where do I even start?
With the constant mental manipulation
With three of four girlfriends?
Where the cutting started and grew?
A failed suicide attempt?
Grades slipping, friendships ruined?
Trust lost, almost running away twice?
But nah. I'm not depressed. My parents insist it.

When I was eight,
I thought I'd always have a friend I could trust
But here I am now, not even trusting myself.

When I was ten,
I thought there were only happy poems
But here I am now, writing this.

When I was twelve,
I thought that one special person would always love me
But here I am now, with 4 bitter exes.

When I was fourteen,
I thought I'd never be depressed,
But
Here
I
Am
Now.

Now that I'm fifteen?
I don't even know what to think.
Whatever it is, there's an 80% chance the opposite will happen
So I think I will commit suicide before I turn sixteen.
But then again, 20% is still a reasonable statistic.

Anyways, point is,
Never in my life, did I, Logan Cestare,
Think I'd be sitting in the bathroom
Cleaning up my own blood that I spilled
At three in the morning

Never in my life did I think
I'd turn out this way.

We never really appreciate things
That we use every day,
Do we?

From the shelter we live under,
The internet used to read this very poem,
To the companions by your side.

We take our **** for granted.
We think, "Because It's always been there,
It'll always be there, no matter what I do."

But when you miss on rent,
Miss a bill or two
Or break someone's heart,

You lose those things.
The things you thought would stay by your side
Are suddenly gone.

Empty chasms occupy the spaces they held
And you search for something to replace them,
But nothing ever really fits like the old stuff used to.

You learn the hard way
Don't take your stuff for granted
Appreciate it while you've got it.

I realized
I do a lot of dumb things
That hurt me more than anything
For little to no reason

This weekend camping by itself
I’ve blistered my hands
I fell on my back swinging on a pull-up bar
Because I was careless.

Other than that, I cut myself every night,
I put off work unnecessarily
And I let myself love people.
Carelessly.

Over
And over
And over.
Every time,

I pour my everything into them
And they play along with it
Until they decide
They’re over me.

And **** man,
Let me tell you.
Heartbreak can be a major cause
To carelessness

Because in that moment,
Your world comes crashing down.
And you don’t care about anything
Except for them.

So when they leave,
You
Have
Nothing.

I’m even doing it again
Right now.
Falling for people
Who don’t give a **** about me.