Don't worry.

I'm here to tell you what you need to hear.
And it's not what you thought you would hear,
And it might not be what you deserve to hear.

Don't worry, it's me.
You don't know me well, but
You should know that I am kind.
I am gentle, and I think about you in that fashion.
My thoughts are not barbed wire,
Nor clear sky.

When I think of you, I think this:

You are foolish.
But so was I,
For years
For the same reasons as you.

And nothing can judge you
But the years,
And the years are nothing if not judgment's mirror.

Lonely years.
I would write poems of hate.
I tattooed my life onto the skin of so many notebooks.
Letters only exist on paper--
How badly I wished my depressing poems would be emblazoned proudly on my soul for all to read.
How cold I felt when I realized nobody wanted to get close enough to see them.

The only tattoos my mind bore
Were freezing outlines of emotions
None of which could burn hot enough to melt the ice they were etched into.

Then something magical:
Neurons. Synapses.
I realized that my mind is not a metaphor.
My mind is not a tangled mess of hyperboles and adjectives.

My mind is not poetry, and life is not scripted.
Nobody's brain is made of prose,
Much as some would like to believe.
Depression is not more noble because it is written well.
And if you have written it, believe me when I say that the way it flows when it is read aloud makes no difference either.

Do you understand?
Here it is, simply:
Step back if you find yourself a step too far into the world of the over dramatized.
Burn your depressed poetry.
It serves no purpose but to remind you of the state you are in.
It dwells in your long-gone years without thought of any future unless that future is your past relived until your future's end.

Poetry is not a coping method.
Poetry is an excuse to linger,
And "coping" is a very poetic way to euphemise that fact.
I have found this out the wrong way.
Poetry is as addictive as alcohol, as drugs, as depression.
They all go together well.
And they don't like to let go once they've started to hold hands.

What I'm saying isn't "stop writing."
What I'm saying is that if poetry is an excuse to linger, you have a choice.
What i'm saying is I hope you choose to linger on joy before you dwell in sorrow.
Because the longer you stay somewhere,
The more it feels like home.


Try to grasp the idea of just stopping,
Letting every idea go
And leaving.
And not coming back for a long time.
And doing it right now.

Realize:
1. The longer you stay sealed inside your mind, the longer you'll have to live with only words as company.
2. Words make terrible company when they're written in sadness.
3. The stars don't give a **** about words anyway.

Be like the stars.

Be with your friends. Make yourself laugh. It'll be hard at first. Then it will be easier. Then other people will be able to make you laugh too.



And one last thing to you specifically,
To you, the person reading this,
The person wondering silently,
The person I've been writing to this whole time--

Realize:
I don't know you.
But I love you.

This is not a joke or a ploy.

I love you.

Somewhere out there, there is somebody that loves you, and it is me and I am not afraid of it.
Find me,
And I will love you openly.
Because if you have the strength to find someone you don't know, you have the strength to find yourself too.
And then you won't need a stranger's love anyway.

It was social experimentation
To be locked away, windowless
Four walls, perpetually fixed
- as his figure in a lightless room
Ears removed, mouth sewn closed
Eyes blinded, no light, no sound
Muted humanity, no dignity

He happened upon a laughing child
before the procedure
and that sound echoed inside
Deep within his bowels it reverberated
Through his blood
Distorted in his stomach
Youthful innocent laugh,
it grew monstrous
It began to talk
and the beast within was personified

Day one he lost his mind
Day two was still day one
(how irresponsive time becomes)
Day three the laugh became a growl
Day four the voices started
Day five in absentia
Day six he was done
Day seven, bizarre interim
- that between life and death

Profoundly lost in swingin' psychosis
Met by the devil in detailed cerebellum
Watched memories deteriorate
like some reel-to-reel burning, spluttering
His wife now only a hydrogen hallucination

Do you, the reader, know true loneliness?

The observation deck was packed on day eight
Muted, yet guttural screams of anguish
from deep within his throat
Were haunting reminders of the damaging effect
of psychological studies and the fragility of humanity

The cataract voids in his stoic face
they betrayed fear, and begged captors
for some respite from this hellish dream

Until in a tormented blinded haze, the voice was clear
His ears still dead, though this voice was true
Spoke but three subtle words
The subject experienced simultaneous neurological
Joy and fear
He had heard the de facto vocalisation of some supreme

he spoke them aloud
his only utterance

and the teary eyed scientists gathered
sterile needle
no words
dead.

She may not have a big ****/big chest
                                                She may not have long hair
                                                                                  She may not have nice things
she may not have the best fashion sense
                                                 And she may not be the prettiest
                                                                          ...just because she doesnt wear makeup
Or just because she doesnt have beautiful features
                                                 Doesnt mean shes not pretty
                                                                          And it doesnt mean she any different
shes better
                                                  Shes herself
                                                                           Shes unqiue and different
and thats alot better than any regular girl
                                                  It takes a REAL man to notice
                                                                            How beautiful she is

I walk out of the corner store and put the chocolate bar in my jacket,
And a pregnant lady looks at me,
With a child of her own soon to be,
I bet she wonders will her son roam the streets,
Late at night,
Even the thought gave her a fright,
I walked across the road to go sit on a bench to watch the cars go by in peace,
I sometimes do that when my friends are out of reach,
I watched the store close, the clerk finally free,
A moment later a middle aged man drove in with his white Toyota,
He was fiending for cigarettes, but the clerks shift was over,
He yelled let me in, come on, let me in,
But the clerk already counted the money in the till,
I then started to grin,
Because i got my chocolate bar, and he missed out on the cheapest cigarettes in town that were more important to him,