I’m sprawled on the couch,
The neon pink stuffed giraffe you gave me
Getting crushed in my strong, anxious grip.
14 hours with no text from you, but
I shouldn’t be worried, there’s a
Perfectly logical explanation for this.
Your phone died and you lost your charger, or
Your mother took your phone as a
Punishment for something, something as simple as
Not making your bed or not doing your homework,
Yet not knowing that she’s punishing me too.
Because I want this to be normal, a simple case of
A disobedient teenager.
But you’re not normal,
And I love you despite that.
No.
I love you because of that.
The last time you didn’t answer me,
You were having a panic attack, your worst one yet,
And you accumulated more prescriptions for your
Anxiety and depression,
More medications, more unreliable solutions to make
The real terrors disappear temporarily.
Then there was the time that your parents divorced,
And you wouldn’t speak to anyone for a week,
And you lost twenty pounds and gained five years,
And everyone who loved you, including me, was worried sick.
The worst was while we were talking on the phone,
And suddenly you cut out and wouldn’t answer
Anything I sent you, and later I learned that you
Tried to take your own life.
Suddenly, I leap up from the couch,
I can’t take it anymore, and march towards the door,
Needing to know.
Yet before I get there, it swings open on its own,
And suddenly you’re standing there,
Wearing my old, baggy sweatshirt,
Your hair in a frazzled mess,
But your cheeks glowing rosy with life.
Throwing my arms around you,
Squeezing you until you grunt in amusement,
I cry, “What happened?  Where were you?”
Pulling me back, putting your hands on my shoulders,
Gazing directly at me with tears in your beautiful hazel eyes,
You whisper, “I tried to leave this world again.  But then
I remembered my last text to you.  I promised
I would never leave you.  And I intend to keep my promise.
Forever.”

Please practice the art of giving up on giving up.

I am a spider, a black widow,
Trapped in her own web.
I weaved it all around me,
With the purpose of trapping another.
My fly was so gullible, so naive,
It was easy, so easy to craft,
The fly falling for the slightest of movements,
The smallest strand of silk.
The fly lies trapped, but unaware,
Never struggling, just hanging there.
Ignorance remains its best friend,
Believing that it is free, opportunities abundant.
It doesn’t know that I have it in my grasp,
Slowly bending it to my will,
Unwittingly creeping closer and closer to its demise.
Yet as it dangles blindly,
I’m thrashing wildly, realizing what surrounds me.
A lucid dream it is, alert to my environment,
But dream control has not arisen.
Praying a dream is all it is,
Struggling against the web I wove,
Drowning in my man-made lake,
Denying all the lies I told.
Accepting my fate as into the web I fold.

In the light, I see the faces of people,
And most are happy.
The smiling mouths, the twinkling eyes,
The joyful expressions.
People in the light can breathe freely,
Carelessly, and easily say that
Everything’s fine.
In the light, I see the normal, everyday
Procedures that comprise the world around us,
The world that we always see in the light.
I see the 9-5 workdays, smell the coffee brewing,
Hear the sweet goodnights and feel the fulfilling sleep.
In the light, no one thinks.  
No one is concerned in the light,
Everything is expected, natural, normal, the usual.
Everything’s fine.
But in the dark, I see the faces of people,
And they are tragically beautiful in their chaos,
Because in the dark they can let it go.
In the dark, no one is watching, and no one is pretending.
People in the dark think, people in the dark
Can easily say that everything is tainted,
Stained by human corruption.
In the dark, breathing is difficult,
And trying to calm your trembling takes
Superhuman strength.
The ache seeps through your bones, muscles, and nerves,
But you know the light is coming, where you
Don’t have to think and you can breathe.
But are you real in the light?

The slide has a 60 pound weight limit.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
It smells like freshly mown grass and a
Soaked one piece Ariel swimsuit—the pink ruffles that
Cling
To a toddler’s stomach rolls as she squeaks and squelches down the plastic
Into the dark blue Made in China kiddie pool
That has creatures from all levels of the ocean together
And she doesn’t care.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Has visible handprints on the sides from
The toddler holding on for dear life before
She gathers the courage to balance on top on her own.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Sits in that yard for almost a decade at the end
Of the sickly green swing set that lifts up out of the ground
Whenever the toddler pumps too hard,
And is a end destination for the intense races across the apparatus
That occur every Sunday noon amongst the Sunday School kids without fail.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Under it is one of the best places for hide-and-seek in the winter,
When it is almost buried under the glistening snow
And the toddler can’t feel her legs anymore but she doesn’t care because
She can’t be found.
At that age she has no limits, no mental restraints that
Cut her dreams off before they bear fruit.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit,
And of the world beyond it she is only a
Prisoner of fierce fascination.

My heart’s in lockdown and
I can’t break free,
I wish I could feel something,
Wish I could be me.

I feel like I’m running in circles,
Striving for emotion,
When all I feel is numb
And sick of my devotion

To the voices in my head
Who keep telling me to quit,
“Why not just give up now,
There’s no way to fix it!”

But I know there’s something there,
In the deepest part of me,
Something that still wants to learn,
Love and move and breathe.

So I will spend some time today,
And love that part of me,
And lock down all the saddened parts and
Start to break free.

He gently traced her scars,
Kissed them gently,
Helped them heal.
She calmed his troubled breathing,
Rubbed his back,
Hugged him tightly.
They were there for each other,
When the world and
Their own minds attacked them,
When no one else came to their aid.
That's love.

~Whenever I see you before you see me, and you're just living your life, I think you are the most beautiful, because you're not trying to impress me, you're just simply yourself~