Every bit of pain I felt as a child
And worked my whole life to forget
Is floating to the surface at an
Alarming rate.

I am not this dark room.
I am not the person to continue this cycle of neglect and abandonment.
Quiet closed doors and feeling like
A stranger, creeping into my kids rooms to stare at their faces while they sleep.
I am not getting swallowed up by
My mental illness.
I am not alone.
I am not hopeless.
I am not my father.

If I don't use destructive coping mechanisms simply out of fear of rejection, abandonment or judgment..
Am I still succeeding?

I have seen
my depressed girlfriend
always embrace the dark
may be, she is becoming
a Persephone
waiting...

"I'm an open book"
She says

Written in
code.

As we sit down to our dinners,
as we open our romance books,
people die.

We sip our water;
their guts spill open.
We study our notes;
their planes crash.

We live;
they die.
We breathe;
they suffocate.

We are testaments to chance,
to luck, to possibility.

We are not products of God.

We are blind goats trotting on our path
before we perish, suddenly,
and vanish into death.

in order for me
to get better it seems
that being broken
is the only way to learn
how to heal

maybe if I'm distracted by loving someone else
I won't have to learn how to love myself