In class
When someone spots my bleeding thumb
Before saying anything to me
Thinking anything
They raise their hand
And say
"Mrs. S! Mrs. S! She's bleeding!

My head screams
"No no no no no"
As I walk to the nurse
What will she say?
What will she do?
Will she ask me questions?
Luckily she didn't
She barely glanced at me
And told me where the bandaids were
Phew!

I wonder what would happen if she saw how bad it looked though...

I fear you
Everyday
Every moment
You're a silent scream
always taunting me
You're unpredictable
Will I see tomorrow?
Will they see a tomorrow?
Why am I still in bed worrying
When there's a whole world?
I fear the last times
The last times I don’t even know are last times
My head takes me to places no one wants to go
You take them away from us
Anyone has the power to use you
We have to trust each other
But not too much
to avoid you

Dear death,
How dare you?

When I'm asked
"Are you an introvert of an extrovert?"
I respond
"It depends who I'm with"

If only everyone
Was a little bit more
Like my cat

Because he sees someone crying
And sits with them to comfort

When I arrive home
He comes to welcome me

No matter how many times
We kick him off the dinner table
He always comes back trying to take
What he believes he deserves
And he eventually he succeeds

He loves
Unconditionally

he's there
Always

And he's absolutely bonkers
But he doesn't care

A prompt in ELA
"Perfect Day"
While everyone started their paragraphs about what their perfect days would look like
With watching TV
And going to the mall
I wrote a poem about how they don't exist
Because she didn't say not to

It went something kind of like this:


There is no such thing as a perfect day
Even if everything goes your way
And you get to sleep in
You eat your favorite food
The sky is blue
Not it's usual gray
And all of your morbid thoughts
Put away

Even if you
Spend the day alone in solitude and peace
Or with your friends
And loved ones
And if you buy a pony
Or win the lottery
Or just smile the whole day
It will never be a perfect day

Because as you lie in bed that night
Or maybe you think about it the whole day
Tomorrow will not be the same
And the sky will return to its gray
And the thoughts flooding back in
And the peace--gone

All my life
I had strived to be normal

Once I finally move to this new school
I will be normal
...I wasn't

Once I style my hair differently
I will be normal
...I wasn't

Once I join this club
I will be normal
...I wasn't

I never was
No matter the rules I made
The clothes I wore
The school I went to

No matter how many how many YouTube videos on how to make friends I watched
The techniques I tried
And the books I read

Now
Only now
Do I finally accept
And take pride in
The fact that I am weird


Now
I try to find
Other weirdos like me
And make them my friends
Instead of the copy pasted people

I am weird
But I am weird
In a good way

He's a real nowhere man
Sitting in his nowhere land
Making all these nowhere promises
To somebody

He's as blind as he can be
Just sees what he wants to see
Nowhere man
Can you see me at all?

You shouldn't wait for someone to lend you a hand
You awful
Awful
Nowhere man

He is the kind of manipulative
That makes question yourself
And your memory
So I found a loophole
I record everything
On my phone
So I can check to make sure

It's sad that I have to do this
With my own father
But I need to
For me mentally

I don't know much about death
Except that it takes your loved ones
It is a big question mark
Taughting me
Constantly

I think
Our brains
Simply can't
Comprehend
That they one day
We won't be there

I don't know much about death
But I know
For some it might be loud
A gunshot the last sound they here
And for some it might be quiet
Alone in world with their last tear

I don't know much about death
But I know
For some it might be at age 6
A very tragic thing indeed
And for some at age 90
Holding the hands of their children
Maybe just as tragic

I don't know much about death
But with great sadness I know
That while some stay until they can't anymore
Some want to go

Death
Holds suspense, grief, and longing
In the palm of his hand
And he boasts it

We humans
We love to compare and contrast
But
We often forget
We don't all have the same denominator

If you look at me in school
You wonder
Why is she so quiet?
What is she even looking at?

If you meet me out of school you wonder
Why won't she stop talking?
Why does she not take anything seriously?

But the thing is
If you know me
The real me
I promise you
If you ask
Or sometimes don't
I'll tell you
The truth
So you won't have
To wonder
Anymore

I refuse to laugh
Just because that's what they do
I'll just observe leaves

I know I am lucky for it
These experiences people my age don't get
Traveling and performing
Playing my instrument
But they don't really know how it is
At home
Scales and metronomes
Haunting me in my sleep
Playing and practicing for my audition
All while crying
Tears rolling down my cheeks as I crescendo
A little sob escapes
During the half rest

I love music
But It shouldn't be this stressful
It's fun when I play with my band
But not alone with my mom
While she's telling me to play that measure again and again
Until I get it right
But I don't really care about that scale
I want to play for fun

I don't like winter for one reason
Because I leave for school before sunrise
And come back
When the sun has almost set
I see no light
And I can't walk
Winter has taken away my walks
They keep me sane
And now they're gone
And so is my wonder
And my joy

Walking in the crowded hallways
The teens yelling
Banging
Talking
Shouting
All of these sounds
Coming from all directions
Making me feel small
And claustrophobic
Suddenly my clothes are too tight and too loose
And my hair is itchy on my neck
Overwhelming urge to scream and run away
To be alone in my bedroom
Where its quiet at least
But no
I need to go to my next class
That I'll forget about as soon as the test is finished
Or maybe before
I don't know

Once when I was around 6 years old
I was ******
At my teacher
So I went and sat under the slide
And I wouldn't move
Even after the whistle was blown
And after my teacher yelled at me some more
And my friend joined me
And then left
And until they say they would call my mom
And that they were disappointed in me
I still sat
That was all I could do at my age to protest
And I did until I felt I had made my impact
Then I got up silently
And went in line
With a smile of satisfaction
And the reminisce of tears on my cheeks

Now
When I'm ******
I sit there
Clenching my fists
And do nothing else
(Outside of my head)

I wish I would be more like 6 year old me
Honestly

A sticky note
Where I'm supposed
to write what I learned today
But the thing is
I learned nothing

One of my friends asked me
"Do you think I'm a good person"
My first instinct was to tell her
"Yes, of course!"
But then I remembered
There's no such thing
I explained to her that I believed
In bad actions
Bad intentions
But not bad people
Because who knows who they would have been if raised even slightly differently
And if it's not because of that
And they're simply born that way
It isn't their fault they are like that
Just bad luck

I say that her intentions are usually good
And so because of that
She should feel that way too

How can a world of
Hugging good books
Walking and listening to music
Dancing in the rain
Collecting shells at the beach and leaves in autumn
Helping someone get through an anxiety attack
Just smiling when there's nothing to say

Also have

Crying yourself to sleep at night
Sitting alone at lunch
Parents who aren't supportive of who their kids are
Parents that mentally insane and not good to be around
Ones that aren't even there
Homelessness
poverty
And war

The dread for tomorrow
Is almost
As bad as tomorrow itself

That fact that you don't feel like it
Or are too scared to do it
Just shows
How much more you need to

Go for a walk?
You should
Take  a shower?
You should
Text your friend?
You should
Get out of bed?
You should
Create.... anything?
You absolutely should

It means almost nothing to me when it is said someone loves my curly hair
It means almost nothing to me when people say they love my green eyes or anything else


The best compliment I have ever received is
"Liana, you're so weird, but in the very best way!"

I feel betrayed
I thought we were a group
We would stick together
Forever
And we would see eachother every week
As long as we wanted to
How dare you leave
I didn't agree
I feel betrayed
I heard it from my mother
You didn't even bother to tell me

The intense urge
To tell you what you've done to me
And how terrible you are
Yet
I just bite my tongue

I am so mad
And I know anger is other emotions wearing a mask
So here are they:
Sad
Hopeless
Depressed
Frustrated
Scared
And more that don't even have words
Mostly them

The words are bleeding out of me
I just feel so bad
All of these feelings bubbling up and boiling
I want to throw them in their faces
So they can burn
All the people who made the world so bad
I know it's a lot of them
But so be it
I don't care
My million feelings taking over
Why is the world so bad?

Today
I just listened
Today
She didn't hear about my insignificant problems
Today
I can't sleep after hearing these things she told me
Today
I want to scream
Today
I feel that the world has no hope
Today
I don't know if I can hug her
Today
I want to fix all her problems
Today
I want to tell her I understand more than she thinks
Today
I feel like crying, just from hearing her woes

I want to cry
sob
And scream

But I'll have to wait until morning
To do those things
Because people can hear me now

Right now
I am lying in bed
It's one AM
And things are haunting me
Making sure that I can't sleep

She came over
And we had fun with friends
Then they left
And we started talking

At first, all light and funny stuff
Until she started opening up
Telling me about such terrors
No one should ever have to experience
And me
Trying to have good, thoughtful responses
Making sure she feels safe
I don't know if it worked

I feel bad
For ever feeling bad
About anything
When she had it so much worse

I wish I could fix all the problems
That her heart holds
So many
She once had to go to a phyc ward

I wish that I would know whether it was okay to hug her
Because I really wanted to
At that moment

So many problems
She is just a girl
This shouldn't be a thing
This shouldn't be real

The world is so ****** up
These shouldn't be problems
People have to face
Now I can't sleep
Simply for hearing them

There are so many things I need to get done
And there is both too much time that I feel I can delay it
And not enough to get it done

I have this friend
And boy, her life is hard
Compared to her mom
My dad is normal
Her dad died
About two years ago
And she has autism
What a life

I invited her over today
To play some board games with friends
And then sleepover
And she said yes
She also said that tomorrow was her birthday

I want to be a good friend
But I don't know what to do
Talking to her is hard for me
I want to ask her about her life
But I don't want to make her uncomfortable
I want to laugh
But I don't know what about

I want to make it fun for her
She deserves it, after all
But how?

I will do my best
It's all I can do
But I'm still stressed
Though I don't want to

I could like whatever I wanted to like

My dad got upset as he always did
Usually something unpleasant for me
Until I decided that it was simply funny
And that I got a kick out of it
And though this was not true
It helped a bit


It was raining and I was walking home from school
Soaked and miserable
Until I decided I liked to walk in the rain
And the rest of the walk went by
---no pain!


I had tripped and fell
Bleeding and trying not to cry
Until I decided that people just decided that pain was a bad thing
So I told myself that I enjoyed it
And it helped a bit

Look what you're doin',
I'm feeling blue and lonely
Would it be to much to ask of you
What you're doin' to me?

You got me cryin'
And there's no fun in it
Why should it be to much to ask of you
What you're doin' to me?

I need to start doing recaps
when I come home
So I know what I am capable of that day
That way
I don't end up exploded and exhausted
My splattered insides looking up at me
From all over the room
Something I can't just clean up with a broom

A blue jay perches
Watches the autumn leaves fall--
And stays there alone

Here, ruining each day of the year
Changing my life with a wave of his hand
Nobody can, deny that he's not okay

There, manipulating all that he can
Both of us thinking how the other one's crazy
Someone has to be
But he doesn't know what he's doing

I want to be left alone
And he's beside me
I know i'll be choking back tears
But to have him as my father is painful
Knowing that he'll never care
Always believing that he is the victim
Getting hurt all the time
And hoping I'll always be there

I want to be left alone
And he's beside me
I know i'll be choking back tears
But to have him as my father is painful
Knowing that he'll never care
Always getting defensive over every little thing
Except for his mistakes
Hoping I'll stay right there

And it makes me sad to say
I see him there, and everywhere
Here, there and everywhere

I've decided
That I will always look up
Because people stare down at their feet all time
And they don't get to see the trees, the leaves, and the sky
And the first time I tried it out
It left me with no doubt
Because I saw an apple tree
The birds soaring
The squirrels in all of their stress
The stars
And it made wonder
Why I ever looked down
When it was so easy to look up
And see the beauties of the world

I know it won't take long
I know he might be okay this time
I know it's supposed to be nice
I know that's what they want me to do

But I know it might be painful for me too

"What's the worst that could happen?"
You have no idea, and trust me, you don't even want to

I know your just asking me
To spend a couple hours with my father
But I really don't want to

Apparently it's "my decision"
But I can't say no to you
I'm used to pleasing you
What can I do?

Whenever I want to keep a straight face
I silently sob in my head
"My dog is dead
My dog is dead
My dog is dead..."

At the store
When I tried on clothes
I felt like I wanted to cry
Not because I really was ugly
(Just a moment ago I was told I was beautiful)
But because
The mirror I looked at
And the lights surrounding it
Made me think that way

You're not ugly
Your mirror is tricking you

You're not stupid
You're a beautiful bird asked to swim in a swamp

You're not unlovable
The people around you are just toxic and don't know how good you are

I might see something scary
And not know which way to turn
And tomorrow may rain
So today
I'll just follow the sun

Because the world is round
the wind is high
And the sky is blue
I cry

I am not ambidextrous
I am anti-dextrous
Neither of my hands can do anything good

I am not golden brained
I am blue brained
Neither side can tell what it's going to be with you
Mania?
Depression?
Anger?
Who knew?!?

I am not ambipedal
I am anti-pedal
Neither of my feet can run away in time

How dare I let myself feel sad?

Have you every heard the someone say
"Someone always has it worse"?
They're trying to help you, but it always ends up making me feel terrible
If someone else has it so bad
My problems just seem silly
So how dare I feel sad?

If I'm mad that my dad is crazy
Someone's dad is dead

If school is stressful and I'm freaking out
Some don't get to go because they are working to be able to buy clothes

If I am crying because I can't stop picking my thumb and it hurts
Some people lost their hand in traumatic ways

If I got in to a fight with my mom
Some people would do anything just to see there's again

Someone always has it worse
And that thought is anything but comforting
Now I feel bad for feeling sad

Flash cards
Headaches
Studying for hours
Trying so hard
Just to be heard

Trying to make friends
Trying to be social
So difficult when your not normal
The things you have to tell yourself
To keep yourself together
"It's okay
Your okay
Everything's okay"
All lies

Concerned looks from your mother
As you say that yes, today was the same
You can tell she's trying not to cry
Guilty

Procrastination
Lack of motivation
Working so hard for this presentation
And for everything else
Even when it all gets deleted in my head immediately after

The crowded hallways
You can barely squeeze your way through
They're so loud
And full of people
Most yelling
Some banging on lockers
Jammed
Like my head

Painted spirals on the wall
Not as real as mine

The noise
Overwhelming
The mind
Racing
The anxiety
Coursing
The calm
Sinking
The food
Inedible
The people
Loud
The loneliness
Skyrocketing

Cafeteria