I'm not defending him,
I'm just stating how I felt
that he was the world and the sunshine,
Even when everything else was a storm.

He was something I wanted to believe in,
Even if I knew that I should not.
Still I can't look at him without thinking what I thought,
I can't link what I've discovered when I'm looking at his face,
or listening to his voice in words that comfort me
and take the only place I seem to hold for him.

I know everyone is only an illusion,
I knew it all before,
This didn't have to be another lesson,
That everyone else seems to take better.

I've memorised, you see,
Everything that will happen
and how you should respond to it.
I knew it all along this journey and did not once forget,
I pushed it aside instead
because I wanted something more.

Now I stand and watch everyone being angry,
Being hateful and for the former rightfully so,
and probably for the latter.
I don't have a place in it though,
I can't do it and I don't want to,
So most of the time I am quiet instead,
Because I know my reasoning isn't in anyone's head.

I know you can't offer sorrow or mercy,
Not to him, and only deranged looks at me.
I believe something went wrong,
Which obviously you can all see,
I know you don't care for the deeper, darker picture
But I can't help but be intrigued.
I know you'd say I'm delusional, weak minded even,
That I just have to find a way to make the reality a little lighter.
You're probably right.

But I don't want to hate him.
I'm getting more distant I think,
In the months away from him,
It's almost like he's not real now:
a figment of a teenage dream,
Tarnished by the nightmares he knew he had created
And hid for his own benefit.

He's a danger to others,
I guess I'm starting to see this slightly when I see his face,
It comes with practice and repeated words to remind myself before I look.
With more time I suppose he'll have completely vanished
And mean less and less,
So that one day I may not need to offer sympathy.

It's just a little secretly funny,
How I doubt my trust for men,
But I ignored his faults so easily,
After all he couldn't touch me
He was too far away, too in my dreams.
Maybe he's just a statement
of how I know to never believe.

I need to stop pretending to have things that I can never have.
So that one day I can't stop,
To freeze my life
So I can - just imagine that.

Sometimes I miss it
But I know it's a bad thing,
Destructive, deceitful and sometimes even
Deadly

And I've secretly been planning,
All of this time,
To go back to it,
In a way that no one will notice,
So that I can get away with it
Without hurting anyone for a little bit,
Only that can't happen now.
Plans have changed so that
I'll never be able to hide it,
And I don't want to feel the shame
When people find out.

More still,
They'll send me to more counselling,
Maybe they'll be more intense this time,
If I did it properly, perhaps they'd send me away,
Sometimes I think I don't
want to ever leave my house again.

I know what they would all be thinking,
See we knew it,
She's completely ******* up there,
That's why her body doesn't work properly,
We told you there is nothing physically!

I shouldn't be admitting it.
None of this,
But really it started with a question
To myself:
Is this a relapse?
Of course not!
You see, I don't do that!
Although, I'm not sure if you're aware,
But I never really tell myself
That I've had a relapse,
Unless it's the good kind.

And that makes me sound sick.
There is no good kind,
It's just the one I'd rather be found doing,
Except I wouldn't.
I never want you to hear me gagging, crying, frantically getting rid of the evidence in the bathroom.
And if you insinuate this at any other time,
I'll sound surprised and maybe even offended,
It's all a lie.
No one knows about all those times,
Not too many, but still,
It is still my secret,
That sometimes I wonder if I'll accidentally take to
The grave, my eventual grave.

I mimic the gesture
And disappointment seeps in,
How can I still joke about this
When I know I could give in?
I cannot brush my teeth each day,
Without remembering.
I wonder why I get more triggered now,
Than I remember feeling.
I feel like I'm betraying everyone I care about,
When I even dare to think about it,
Yet they never know a thing.

The truth we should tell?
If it's hard and hurts then you don't want to hear it, huh?
Yeah I know but still.
I respond to one part only,
Just as I can multitask doesn't mean I will.
The truth is nothing's ever good enough,
Anything we could do,
There's always faults wherever you are but what's it like to ignore them?
Sometimes I think I ignore plenty,
Even though there is still many,
You can never run away from anything
And facing them doesn't always work out.
In fact I don't think we realise
What facing up to things are either
-I don't-
If you're scared of something,
Then you gave it the chance didn't you?
So haven't we faced up to it?
I have no clue it's like we can only praise ourselves for this if we succeeded,
If we made it past it,
But when I past obstacles I act like it meant nothing,
So that I can disconnect from it because I don't want anymore of it again so I say it's gone now.

How can you keep fixing things
When they break
So easily?

How do you turn your back on
A friendship you tried
So hard for?

How can you stop viewing memories
You wish stayed a little longer
Before all of them burned to the ground
Only soot left now,
But you'd like there to be more?

How do you prepare yourself
Each and everyday
When really, living scares you
And wish everything would go away?

I take a breath
Tell myself to be quiet again
And then I walk outside.

Everything else is dying around me,
but somehow I'm still here
It's not hopeful and a heart filled with faith drops to the floor
and shatters into a million hurt feelings and angry concealed words that shall not be spoken

I'm not happy at all
And I can't seem to explain it very much for people to see its actuality,
Not enough to understand how much it consumes me
When I don't even know myself.

It's a good job I don't have a father
Because he'd only ever be disappointed in me
Every single second.
I don't even know why it keeps coming back to that;
I find it repulsing because I never used to care
And I never should and it makes me hate everything a little more
Each and every time I fall again.

I hate the way this poem complains
And sounds like a pointless wining child.
It's just like I'm listing complaints,
Which literally I am
How ******* pathetic is that?
I can't even make it go right and now that I've started
I wish I'd stopped.
In just a few seconds I'll post to prove
Just how much I get wrong daily.

Don't think I'm asking for sorrow and praise,
I never do that because I know there won't be any responses.
People complain elsewhere about being taken ill
Some people wonder if it's also for attention,
But if I did that then I wouldn't get a single mention.

All my aggravation is erupting to the surface,
But volcanoes create a more magnificent disaster
Whereas my destruction is purely chaotic,
No one else notices.
I either try to hide it or attempt to subtly admit it
Which I guess no one takes seriously
And I keep thinking it doesn't need to be.
I'm starting to wonder if it will actually become a problem
Because it feels like a lot,
Although as it's me
It's probably not.

All this is just so stupid.
It changes and then you just keep going with it.
You keep stepping out of the door everyday,
Because why wouldn't you?
You get used to it
And you keep going.
You move past it.
Yeah, it might be there to haunt you
So what? You deal with it.
It gets to the point where it doesn't matter anymore;
That's just how it is;
Nothing can be changed.

Except that's how it's supposed to be,
That isn't what it's really like,
Not for me.
I get up everyday and continue,
Because why would there be an excuse?
I don't have a reason to be unable
- or at least that's what others must see too.
You don't get used to it.
The memories lurk here everyday,
And the walls you walk past are thick with what used to be and thin with what is.
You act like you're dealing with it
To yourself and everybody else,
But truthfully you fall to the floor more often than not,
Because there's flashing lights and sirens from when it all went wrong,
And reminders of how good it felt to seem perfect.

That's just how it is;
Nothing can be changed.
Yet still it continues to feel:
Exactly the same,
Maybe it's weaker from time to time,
Occasionally you'll be led to think it's not as bad as it was before,
But you will realise again,
That it's not planning on going away.

Maybe then he'll care
Except I'm seeking attention from
Someone who isn't there

I can't thread my thoughts into beautiful emotion
They're too unprepossessing
And tangled in fear.
If you could hear all this noise,
It would sound disgraceful
I'm sorry my dear.

Ask me in the night,
How I am feeling?
I’ll still tell you I’m alright,
But part of me won’t want to.

You see there’s this ache
Somewhere inside
Telling me to push it out, to make it escape.
It won’t go.
There’s no point passing it around
It only ever makes people leave.

Yes, right, okay:
Maybe I am delusional, deceptive
And, it’s all my wrong idea
But that still doesn’t make it fine.
Why shouldn’t we worry that our own damage
Will be someone else’s collateral?
Do you not think I’m aware?
Maybe I’m not still naive.

If you’ve come here for the truth,
Then I am coping just fine,
In fact it was better than ever
And all blue skies.
That’s also probably the reason why
People don’t realise.
If you’re around when I’m like this,
If you’re in the way of my state
And there’s nothing left to do,
Then I won’t bother to hide it from you.

Actually, I hate to admit it,
But I’d probably go all out in making sure you knew,
Because what else is there to do?
Where’s the point? Even if you told me where it was, I’m not sure I’d go find it.

But if someone new walks in,
If it’s someone presenting opportunities;
A meaning.
I follow through with that instead,
I get on with it and then afterwards,
When I’m alone,
I close my eyes and remember what I was feeling the last time I pushed it aside
And I dissolve into it
Because I’m back to not caring,
I’m back to believing in how bad I feel
And maybe I don’t mind.

I'm caught up in the mist that is my mentality.
I lust for the truth,
except it's hard to find.
The clouds fall down
and it's hard to see:
Only falsities can ascend in the darkness.

When you have too much will,
there's no way,
and no place where you can go.

Stuck in my despair of not knowing what to do so,
I give myself a time scale
of learning things I'll never know.

Do I even want the truth,
or will it be worse than the unknown?

I still live in the longingness of finding,
I have no clue where I am even going.

But maybe it's further away.

Can I leave myself behind,
or is this already my decay?

Something always has to break to bits.

Just until it's

Gone.

Left.

Like everything else.

How can I settle
When life feels like it's
Falling apart inside of me?

Whatever I make of myself
Will be only a whisper,
Explaining only pointless,
All of my purpose
Doubtful.

Who wants to be the first poem of the New Year.
Not me. Do you want to be?
I don't think you understand,
If you win then you really lose;
You'll either be in devastating pain;
Or you've made me hate it all.

I like to disappear,
When I go to this place
I will be putting myself there
And I don't know what to wear.
I haven't done this for so long,
When I went to parties then you just wear
Jeans and a t-shirt.
The people invited I see go to parties,
Through pictures formed of pixels on my phone,
The connection to the outside world without leaving my bed;
It's kind of easier I guess.
They wear short dresses
And get way too drunk for their heads.
I'm not sure I have any dress I could wear and fit in with the rest,
Somewhere it takes so much effort to be in.

I ask 'come save me?'
But no ones there,
No one can do a thing.

How can you hide in a bathroom,
To practise your breathing,
If you can't even get up and find it?
And how can I be somewhere crying,
If I will never be alone?
Even if I get to a toilet,
Many people will come and go
Especially with all the alcohol.
The more I try to avoid it,
The faster it's here to destroy me.
How can I be enthusiastic and happy
For my best friend
Because it's her birthday
When I can't say or do a thing?

I'll have to do it one day,
I'll have to do it one day,
But I don't have to if I avoid it everyday.
Who says I need to go to parties?
Not me exactly,
But I can already feel what it will be like
When I'm thirty knowing that I wasted all my teenage and young adult years.
I just can't put up with all the fears.

This time I'm obligated,
By myself, she said she won't force me,
Guessed that I wouldn't becoming,
And I told her I will,
How could I not?
The more I think, the harder it gets.
Part of me at some point thought it might be good to try.
Do I really want to fail in front of that many people?
These are the people I hide from at school.
I don't go to the common room because it's full of other people.

I'm sure they think it's weird,
What I'm like, that is.
I used to constantly be asked
If I was alright,
Just because I was silent at these things.
I pulled a smile and said "yeah, why?"
They spoke about me being quiet, not saying anything.
I said that's all it is,
But it's a social thing.

How many times could I stop?
How many times do I want to just turn it all off.
It would still exist but maybe I could get rid of it for a while.
Just never look again,
But I need to find out things;
I can't just back away;
Or try that way of making me okay.

I'd like to be normal please,
Not having to wonder about what will happen when I leave
Thinking I'll feel trapped again,
Where I won't even be able to do anything.
Nostalgia always envelopes me and mixes with what I want the future to be
But it hurts me and I just have to stop and think,
Because I'm not sure that's attainable anymore.

Then I think I need comfort,
I imagine what could have been
Which is painful too,
But what else can I do?
I try a lot but often I'm too scared to,
Instead I just sit there.
I feel like I don't want to do anything again,
Then I have to move and carry on with the rest of the world.
I seem just fine,
I look the same as I've always been.
It's easy to be overlooked when you never get a second glance,
And if I do then I just look happy,
When really on my own I'm not coping.
I've tried to explain but I can never express all of it,
No one could understand anything
Because it's everything together
When what I have on the inside feels a bit like nothing.

I always give most people the benefit of the doubt,
Whether they seem like they should receive it or not,
So why should I keep doing that now?
It usually only turns out to be wrong.

Seeping in again,
Can I wash it out?
These same old feelings
Are coming out to play.

Maybe I should let this settle me,
After all it’s been a while,
Shouldn’t it be nice to know it still exists,
That I am capable of still feeling like this?

Fearful, nervous, agitated
There is no reason, it’s just me.
The only change of plans is that I now don’t have to force it,
I don’t have to go outside,
It usually gets worse when I have to do the opposite,
So this should make me feel relief,
Instead I am still wired.