I walked ten thousand miles
In the many years
I've joined hands with my insanity
Walked hand in hand
Like shadows and feet
Grasping a new perspective on the instance
That reality is just a fictional world
We lose ourselves in
Where is the real you?
Is that truly you in the mirror
Or the reflection of the world
Taken it's tole on your weary bones
Fragile shapes bearly holding a grin
I've walked so many beaten paths
Beaten so many paths
Bean beaten by paths
Yet still find myself walking
Down the only path
Covered by thorns and barbed wire
One way in no way out
It's the path we all walk unknowingly
The path of our own troublesome sanity

Stop talking to the people who are not worth your time, who cause you unnecessary drama, and make you feel worse about yourself.

Be honest with yourself.

You have fewer friends than you thought. Your cafeteria table slowly decreases in size, as do your social commitments, but you do not have any drama, no shallow or fake nonsense. Slowly, everyone starts to seem annoying, and irritating, and you do not want to converse with any of them, ever again.

Do not have many friends, and sway between feeling sorry for yourself and feeling like you are superior.

When the one friend you do have does not come to school because she has to take a driving test, eat your lunch alone, and listen to music on your iPod so you do not appear as alone as you feel. Realize your condition has gotten much worse.

People talk to you. You feel ecstatic, even though you won’t admit that to yourself.
You get a shot of adrenaline when you feel as if you’ve breached their walls.
You try to say something—an opinion, an agreement, anything.
They ignore you.
You walk away, and think: you are above them anyways.

Do not get invited to parties. Think it is because no one likes you. Be sad; be resentful. Think about all the things you are missing at a dumb party thrown by a sophomore—which is bound to fail, and bound to get broken up by the cops. Realize that the reason you are not invited is more likely because you have never show any interest in parties. Force yourself to feel grateful for the lack of an invitation; no cops will come knocking on your door, asking questions.

Plus, you have to go to work tomorrow, and that is much more important.

When the party does get broken up, pretend that you knew it was a bad idea and that you had never wanted to go. Listen to the stories of running from the police, through thorn bushes, with a twinge of jealousy.

Not only do you not go to parties; you do not have any plans for the weekends at all.

Never have sleepovers. Instead, wake up at 12:00 in the afternoon, stay in your pajamas, and have a Netflix marathon of Supernatural. Eat a lot of junk food and think, “**** it!” and then immediately regret it, you are trying to lose weight.

If you lose weight, you won’t be a loser anymore.

If you lose weight, people will still remain the same.

You cry, because you think it’s what you should do.
You feel pathetic.
The tears running down your cheeks do not do justice for the raw, uncomfortable feeling making your stomach clench.
You are stronger than all of that.

You sit on your bed and think about a better time, a better place, when you felt accepted, loved, and even popular.

Think about the time you weighed a good fifty pounds less. You were on top of the world.

Talk about your future, because at least you have them beat there. You will go all the way.

Think about your straight A’s. Get on the scale. 145, 160, 194 pounds; why do those numbers matter? The 98’s are the ones that are going to get you into a good college.

College…
High school.
Present.

Walk through the double doors with staggering confidence.

Talk about how you are a loser—it makes people believe that you do not actually see yourself that way. Losers would never admit that they are a loser. Plus, the people you are talking to are obligated to deny the fact that you a loser, no matter their opinion. It’s common courtesy. Sometimes you want them to deny it, and sometimes you want to prove to them, and to yourself, that it is okay to be a loser.

You define yourself as one because sometimes you are proud of it.
Why?

You think: I do not want to be friends with these people; they are annoying, petty, and shallow. I am much more independent and mature. I’m off to better, bigger things.

Later
You think: it would be nice to have a few more friends, people to talk to, people who care.


Get assigned a creative essay titled, “How to Become a…”

Choose: “How to Become a Loser”

Plan on the piece being light, funny, and paradoxical, ending it with a sarcastic, but optimistic line.
Realize that you are not the loser; everyone else is.

Doubt yourself.
Realize this is no longer a humorous essay.

I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm,
yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new,
in city and in forest they smiled like me and you,
but now it's come to distances and both of us must try,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.
I'm not looking for another as I wander in my time,
walk me to the corner, our steps will always rhyme
you know my love goes with you as your love stays with me,
it's just the way it changes, like the shoreline and the sea,

but let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't
untie,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.
I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm,
your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm,
yes many loved before us, I know that we are not new,
in city and in forest they smiled like me and you,
but let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't
untie,
your eyes are soft with sorrow,
Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.

After you leave, I smoke cigarettes until
I can go to the bathroom and
Throw everything up; all these stupid,
Useless feelings, and
They lie in the toilet until
I flush them away.

When he tells you
That you see through the eyes of a poet,
When you see the evening traffic
Like a string of glistening pearls in the sparkling cold of a wintry night,
When you hear the steel letterbox snap like a mousetrap
And the mail flop behind your door like a dead rat,
When your finger traces the days’ old dust on your coffee table
And your eyes trail in the wake of a churning steamboat ,
When you say you accept chaos and it’s underlying order
And vice versa,
When he brings you coffee and you say “Thanks”
He tells you
That you see through the eyes of a poet
And what he is saying is...
You Are Mad.

And  you realise why you see him as blank verse -

Prose pretending to be poetry.

after, when you are driving
75 miles one way just to get to her
and her wind-touched hair,
bleached white by the September
sun, the gray sky coughing up clouds,
that is when the doubts surface,
hard as stones.

it is late afternoon by the time you arrive,
the storm has already been through here.
you are not in your own element.
you are a runaway.

but, then she is there, standing right in front
of you, wet with rain, slender as a branch.
you watch as she makes her way over
and your heart gardens, rupturing red.