To the children who only find solace in ****** knuckles and broken toes
The pill is a hard one to swallow, especially if you're swallowing an entire bottle of them
It takes the earth 365 days to orbit the sun but it only takes you one second to love yourself if you try hard enough

Your friends and your family love you more than this, trust me
Your problems are insignificant above everything else and I'm sorry if it sounds like I'm preaching as I'm saying all of this
Just take it from another who had the same mindset
You will find peace in suffering just like you have found peace in past happiness
Be grateful that you have a heart to feel everything that happens to you, just please don't convince yourself that you would take being dead over trying to make something of your ruins
With disaster comes beauty and we are all disasters doing our best to become beautiful once more, we will get there one day if we work hard enough

To the ashes of half smoked cigarettes and to the ashes of broken relationships
Fire will burn down anything if you let it consume you enough
I am so sorry you are suffering
I am so sorry you are feeling this way
But the end of the rope or the tip of a bullet has not a ******* thing on what your life will give you
It may seem like hell now but heaven is just over the hill and if the view of rainbows and the sound of chirping birds won't convince you that there is a calm after the storm, you will never experience the calm before it

No, it isn't easy
But it isn't hard
Give yourself to your angels and let go of your demons, this is not their battle to fight

DO NOT LET YOURSELF SLIP
YOU ARE RESISTANT AND YOU ARE EVERLASTING
YOU HAVE NOT BEEN STOPPED YET, THEREFORE YOU WILL NOT BE STOPPED AT ALL

Therapy isn't pretty and neither is sadness, but the dirt must be dug up before the flowers can be planted
You aren't crazy for thinking about what you think about, please never forget that
It isn't about maintaining normal thoughts, it's about letting it all out
If we never let anything out, we'd explode, and it's better to bleed than to ignore being hurt
It's best to let your wounds bleed and heal than to let your bandaids become ***** and infected

I'd rather send a get well card than a funeral invitation
I'd rather see you in a hospital bed than a casket
I'd rather say, "We will get through this together. I love you so much. This fight isn't over." than say, "He was such a strong person. I'll never forget him."

What I'm trying to make you understand is that life will throw you into vines and thorns and leave you out of breath and cut to shreds, but the sunlight isn't just a dream and happiness isn't just a figment of your imagination
Things will become problematic and ugly, but muscles must be torn apart and bruised to grow back stronger

Build a bridge between your sadness and your happiness, and as you cross it, admire it all
It's all here for a reason, just like you are

Do whatever it takes, but whatever you do, just do not give up

I remember you telling me before that you saw yourself as a jigsaw puzzle.* I never understood you then because why would you compare yourself with a thing that requires pieces. You explained that you have 6 pieces in you, pieces that made you, created you. Pieces that were the reason for the person you are today, pieces that helped you function, in other words, pieces that made you whole. That was why you called yourself as a 6 piece jigsaw puzzle. But then one day, you told me all of those pieces were missing. You said someone or something took it away from you and you have no idea how to get them back. You explained to me thoroughly how they were removed from you. The first piece was removed when you were in your room one night, hearing your parents fight, yelling and arguing, telling hurtful things to each other. So you decided to put some headphones on and played some music so you wouldn’t hear their shouts but then they barged into your room saying one of them is leaving and you have to decide which one of them you are coming with, you pretended to not hear them but deep inside of you, even though how loud the volume was, it suddenly stopped without you muting it, because all you could hear was their love for each other slowly fading away. The second piece was removed when one day some unwanted visitors came into your house and they told you they call themselves as demons and that they brought you things that you cannot possibly return; you opened the boxes and see that those things were called depression and anxiety. The third piece was removed when your so called best friends told you they were always there for you but when you were sitting on a bathroom floor filled with blood and hopelessness nobody came to pick you up.  The fourth piece was removed when you someone told you they will help you find those lost pieces but one day she was just not there, and instead of finding the missing ones, one of the remaining was lost again. The fifth piece was removed when you saw him, the love of your life, loving another being that wasn’t you and when you asked why he told you he just couldn’t deal with someone who was like a puzzle that wasn’t solved, you were about to tell him you were once the one he was looking for but then he told you, oh scratch it, a puzzle that could never be solved. And the last and final piece was removed, because life took it away from you. And then suddenly all of those pieces were lost.


I want to help you, i want to do everything just to find those pieces. But you’ve got to help yourself also. You are the biggest help you need, and maybe, just maybe, those pieces can be found in the most unexpected places. Perhaps the first piece can be found when you’re listening to your favourite song and the lyrics felt like blankets that comfort you when it’s cold and suddenly it felt like home. First piece found. Perhaps it’s the feeling of waking up at 5:30 in the morning, feeling ******, and when you went outside, you saw the sunrise, and realised that somehow you can rise again like that. Second piece found. Maybe it was sitting in a cafe, sipping unnecessary caffeine, looking at the people who were passing in front of you, thinking of how much they’ve been through, and still surviving like you, and somehow that made you feel better, that’s why your face formed an unnecessary smile. Third piece found. Maybe it was when it rained so hard, but it doesn’t compare to your tears, you cried and cried, as the rain poured and poured, then the rain suddenly stopped and the sky formed a rainbow, you looked at it and think that maybe your tears can form colours too. Fourth piece found. Perhaps it’s when you can’t sleep at night, so you just look at your scars, before you thought they were ugly and disgusting, they did nothing to you but made you remember how much of a mess you are, but now you look at them in a different way, they weren’t battle scars, because battle was an understatement on how difficult the things they had overcome. And now you see them as a reminder of how much of a soldier you are. Fifth piece found. And maybe, it was when you decided to go to an art museum, you were fascinated by the wonderful paintings, then you thought, you used to be like those works of art; beautiful and important. But then you suddenly heard one painting, whispering you something, it said, a masterpiece is still a masterpiece no matter how broken it is. Sixth piece, and final piece, found.


So, darling, If by means life took those away from you, you should do everything to get those back. And yes, you will tell me, nothing can bring back those pieces anymore, but you can be a puzzle piece that is solved without the pieces you had before, you can find those pieces without asking for help, you can find those on your own, you can make pieces all by yourself. It doesn’t matter how fast you puzzled it out, the only thing that matters is that you solved it. *You solved the jigsaw puzzle. You solved you.  **And guess what? You will be whole again. You will realise you always was, and that is the reason you will not let anyone or anything, change that again.

Hi my names Lauren and I love things that can't speak.

Hi my names Lauren and I love things that break their own bones and choke on their teeth.

Hi my names Lauren and I see kids with bruises, kids with no excuses, kids with cuts, kids howling at the moon like mutts. They're begging to get out of their skin and into a more feral suit, they want their bite to be worse than their bark, hang themselves in the park, finally be noticed, glowing smiles like that of an alley cat, spat out blood last week, "must've been the pills, that **** kills."

Hi my names Lauren and I forget my name a lot. I write it in the hearts of heartfelt hoodlums, not so brave victims, mothers' worst nightmares, mothers who don't care, boys who dare set themselves on fire, light it up ******, you aren't getting any brighter.

Hi my names God and I ****** up.

Hi my names Lauren and I talk to the dead. They tell me about the papers they keep under the bed, poems no one reads and suicide notes with things unsaid.

Hi I'm Lauren and the dead can't dance when they speak. They're not too steady on their feet, dangling from rafters with chairs beneath.

Hi I'm Lauren and I ****** up, you ****** me up. You won't talk to me, and he won't look at me, and dad can't stand me and mom tries her best to understand me and I once hit my head so ******* the wall I fainted. Yes mom, it was on purpose. I thought we painted that pretty picture in my blood months ago.

Hi I'm Lauren and I write poems that don't lie about the truth, I write poems about depressives, lost boys, starving boys, ****** boys, and my boys. Those all go hand in hand. I write poems about heartache, bone break, undertake, and personality fake. These are all the same. I write poems about things I've seen, things I've done, things I've ******, and threads that were spun into ropes tied into nooses and put behind the pile of ***** laundry on the floor. I write about pills in dressers and knives in scabby skin and how much I hate god but love his children and how my brain is broken and I'm still stuck hoping I'll be left with something to write about next time I forget my name but can remember yours.

It all happened the night I sat on an empty seat on the train. My body was tired, I feel like my eyes would shut down in any minute, I couldn't even say something because my mouth was probably exhausted too (of speaking too much, probably), but one thing is for sure, my mind will never be worn out. My mind will never stop. Funny, I thought, when you are happy and contented about everything in your life, or when your whole self is already numb and can't feel anything whilst without any caution your mind will explode with thoughts and ideas that could either save or destroy you. But my mind isn't exploding at the moment, my mind isn't experiencing any chaos and war inside of it, there was only one thing my mind was telling me, that I just want to be left alone tonight. Maybe that's why I sat on an empty seat on the train.

I wasn't left alone the moment an old woman sat beside me. I was ******, beyond ******, I'm having one of the worst days in my life and all I want right now is to be alone in this world and then one person would sit beside me.

“Tough day, huh?” She asked me. I just smiled and nodded at her, I was too tired to say something, but I wasn't tired to realize how bad I acted. I started feeling guilty of the things rattling around my head.

“It's just a bad day, sweetheart. Not a bad life.” This woman is obviously trying to start a conversation, I hesitated to talk to her at first, but then maybe my mouth would be less tired when I decide to speak again.

“I'm sorry, I'm just, tired.. Tired of everything, I guess.”

“I understand, sweetie. Wait, I know, why don't we just play a game? 20 questions?” Wow, 7 minutes ago I was just asking to be all by myself and now I'm about to play a game with a stranger. Even worse, she will know 20 facts about me.

“Uhm, okay, I guess.”

“Okay, me first. The most cliché question of them all, what's your favourite color?”

“Blue.”

“Ahh, let's proceed to the next one.” And the next ones became even more predictable. Favourite movie, book, food. I felt irritated but at the same time, relieved. She wouldn't know 20 facts about me, I could always lie. However, epiphany hit me when I forgot she has only been asking 19 questions, then the last question erased all my relief.

“And the last question I have before I leave, who is your favourite almost?”

“What? I don't understand.”

“Is it the boy you kissed one sunday night but after that he told you goodbye, and you didn't know he meant it, that's why you started wondering where's the good in that word? Or is it the boy who told you he loved you every single day and suddenly one day he decided not to talk to you ever again like those days never happened? Is it the boy who was the reason you lied when I asked you what was your favourite colour, it wasn't blue, wasn't it? It was the colour of his eyes. Or maybe, it's that someone who looked at you like you were the entire universe but the world decided that being inlove with a universe is a dangerous thing to do, that's why they did everything to part the ways of you two. Now tell me, dear, who is your favourite almost?”

And then suddenly I was awaken. I no longer felt tired, like my body can move again right now. And that my mind is exploding again, I even think it will burst. “I... I don't.. know.”

But who is it, really? It was hard deciding when somebody's lips were the reason why I felt alive sometime in the past, when the words of that somebody were at the same time my disease and my cure, my hurricane and my sunshine, my poison and my antidote. When somebody's eyes became my favourite colour of all time that's why whenever I see things that are green I feel like I'm still at home, and when somebody had the power to make me the universe when I'm just a human being, clearly a dangerous thing, but I would gladly experience the danger to be with that someone again.  

I was about to say something when the doors of the train opened and the woman suddenly stood up, she was about to leave, I guess. She smiled at me and walked away. But one last time, she turned around said these words to me:

“You almost knew, didn't you?”

And just like that, I was left alone on the empty seat on the train.