There is You,
my son, and You.

The You that died;
the You which we see
on rising
in photographs on walls
or framed or there
by the window;
the You staring back at us
from our mobile phones.

There's the You I saw
brought into the world
pink and small
and wanting to feed
and latch on
for the liquid food.

The You growing up
from baby to toddler,
mischievous, but loving.

The You growing
into manhood,
stoic and quiet
and brave, going about
in your own way
to climb many a mountain
of adversity
and reaching the top
and over it
and quietly smile
and unseen
in a corner, sit.

There is the You
of quiet talk,
of gentle words;
You of soft
under the breath swearing,
if the referee
had got it wrong.

There was the You who
became ill so suddenly;
the You who was let down
by medical professionals;
the You we loved,
the You whose heart
flat-lined and died.

There is You,
my son, and You.

The You who was taken
and the You whom we feel
around us still,
touching;
walking by
out of the corner
of our red rimmed eye.

My grandpa took me camping
it was an intervention
this was denied by him of course
as soon as it was mentioned.

We pitched a tent on forest floor
told tales around the fire
we swam the lake and walked the hills
no WiFi his desire

The night was filled with twinkling stars
the heavens lay before us.
We woke refreshed and entertained
by a hundred bird dawn chorus.

We packed our kit and travelled home
of signal I was dreaming
I heard that beep, so comforting
my cue to begin streaming!

I envy those who can eat without conscience
I long for the infamous day when "things will get better"
I strive for an impossibility that I can feel within my reach
I expend the necessary energy to achieve a negative net
My mind rattles with number and limits
Counting the minutes 'til my next meal
Portion control and restrictions
Fighting the urges of binges
They say I'm just skin and bones
But what I see is all I'll know

You hate my poems
You say they take me from you
that they're pointless
a waste of time
maybe you're right.
You read them,
just the words as they fall,
and say you get nothing
just syllables.
I have lost count
of the sighs and eyerolls,
the you have no talents,
they sit in a memory box
along with the times you've asked me to stop.
Stop.
Just like that.
Stop pouring myself onto paper,
Stop looking for beauty in darkness,
Stop healing.
You prefer me broken, fragile, dependant,
the girl you took from nowhere to god knows where
a once pretty, broken thing
to hang silently from your arm
while you talk proudly of the soul that you saved.
You fear that my writing will end us.
I fear that my stopping will end me.

You pull on my lip like an aircraft emergency oxygen system.
Our engines catch fire
as our tongues flutter like the wing's peeling metal,
and as our eyes peek at one another
between each plane crash of lips.

We've lost cabin pressure
as we can no longer control our bodies.
We gasp for each other's breath
as our shimmering structures
roll around on the sky of my bed.

We kiss like we've only got seconds left,
when in reality,
these moments will never die
even if we do.

Dear Talia,

I don't want to be a tortured artist.
I don't want to be depressed and I don't want to be anxious.
Competitive sadness and disorders treated like accessories disgust me.

The world glamorizes mental illness, and I don't understand why. There is nothing romantic about being mentally ill just like how there's nothing glamorous about a broken wrist or a torn medial collateral ligament. There's nothing romantic about constantly being afraid that the world will fold in itself and **** you with it. There's nothing romantic about feeling like you could break down and cry at any moment.

This is the first piece I've written while being medicated.

I want it to be Christmas already.

The world dreams itself a halo, but can only attain horns. The halo is an illusion and the horns are an idea.

I'm due to take another Lorazepam. Would I look cool to the kids who idolize dysfunction and misinterpret pain as style, if I were to take one of these, with water and a distant glance, in front of them? Geez, to have their approval would to have everything and nothing at all.

I'm not sure why I've written as much about this as I have.

You.

It is 2:48 am and all I can think about, in this moment, is you.

I can't wait to spend Christmas with you. I can't wait to wear bad Christmas sweaters, and be the couple everyone hates, as we sing Christmas carols and spread holiday cheer.

I wrote this poem a few minutes ago. Sometime around 2:30 am. I'm not sure. I'm exhausted:

I sat on the edge of my bed, and on the edge of my life,
medicated to the point of pointlessness. Soft.
It was the nineteenth, not the twentieth,
and I wished I saw the fireworks with her fifteen days earlier.

My gasps tore the shingles off of the house.
And they hung suspended above the hole in the roof.
And God stared down into my room, as the shingles swirled skyward.
"I see you," I said, "but I don't believe in you."

I left home and ran until I was a dream that had passed itself.


I hope that was okay.

I love you.


Yours,

Joshua Haines

I hate being up in the morning
every morning the same,
rising with no hope of relief
I mean, why bother?
There's no warmth to nestle in,
no dark to slip into
no sweet scented dew
to take this ache from my head.
Frankly I feel mocked,
as though old beady eye is thumbing his nose,
laughing maniacally at my frustration
He deserves a beating,
to be pounded with fervour
but I wouldn't give him the satisfaction.
So I sit and smoke
giving my best thousand yard stare
rivalling Clint Eastwood,
while he stands proudly smirking,
defiant, unyielding
a stand off, silent
as I ignore his twitchy responses to my stoic suffering
His resolve only stiffening mine
as I refuse to make his day.

The pale petals rest
in Yiska's palm.

She blows on them,
brings them
a shadow of life.

I smell her perfume.

My heart dances
in my chest
at her approach.

Now the petals
fold and die
in her ageing palm.

She tips them away.

My heart beats slow
at her departure.

Her eyes are closed,
her hair is grey.