I don't wanna write anymore
Don't wanna draw anymore
Don't wanna sing anymore
Don't wanna breathe anymore
When I was little they said I was wonderful at all these things
(Except for one
You can blame my dad who trashed my lungs)
And I
Being the budding flower of future disaster
Shaped myself around these things
I branded myself ART KID
I spent hours drawing the individual scales of fierce crayon dragons
I wanted to write and illustrate my own books
But when you get older you read Fitzgerald
When you get older you visit art museums
I can recognize a Rembrandt painting from across a hall so it's easy enough to recognize trash when I see it
Crumpled paper ***** lay scattered around my bedroom floor, my wastebin is full with wasted dreams and how did they ever let me think I could be worth something?
I guess I had potential
So they weren't really lying
But it hurts
You walk around in massive shoes expecting to grow into them but you just get blisters from the friction
I don't fit into this mold but I built it myself so why not?
It hurts
When you're used to the sun then suddenly night comes and you have to invent the lightbulb
But it was always there before
And now it's just gone
Like moments, like people, like potential
So where do we go from here?

please don't hate me
if we don't get to live these dreams

i have found that dreams never quite work out
not even in sleep

please forgive me if i give up
even after all this time
all these pills
all this therapy
after hours spent in behavioral unit B

please don't hate me
i'm just tired
this world is exhausting and unfair
no perfect god created us
there is no guaranteed light waiting at the mouth of any of these dark tunnels
we just go along
everything just happens
and i am not "meant to be" anything
not even alive
not even breathing

try to understand
i live for very few things
my future, my dogs, the need to be loved before i'm gone
but my future looks rickety
the wood is splintering and the nails are mostly rust at this point
i wasted too much time on things i can't control
and threw away all my potential
and my dogs are getting old
and i only leave muddy footprints on the world
stuck with in betweens and goodbyes
she wrote a poem that called me cancer
i listened

please believe me
i hate my lies, i do
i wish i could control it
i wish i didn't keep color coded strings tied to my fingers, coordinating who i am to different people and what has spilled out of my mouth, burning my tongue, deceptive acid
i hate my lies and dreams and body and breathe and spirit
hell, i hate my passion, it leaves me covered in scars and red streaks
i don't know how to keep energy from turning into anger from turning into marred flesh
i have no self control
but that's a lie, i do, i've stopped myself before,
it's just sometimes i think if i carve words into my skin these things can never leave me please god don't leave me

my chest hurts
all that's left is
i can't touch that, can't listen to that, can't look at that
can't really explain why except for that i can't
can't tell the truth to save my ******* truth
can't remember what i said two minutes ago
can't keep it together keep it together keep it TOGETHER
and i have all these dreams but that's all they can be so why do i fight so hard?
ruining my own life just because it's in my hands
i ruin anything i'm entrusted to take care of
my hands shake too much and i can't quite hold on
and now i'm making excuses like this is out of my control
is it out of my control? is it under my control?
i can't answer these questions i don't know what i'm making up anymore
it all just runs together looming dark and dangerous over my skin
sometimes it sets into my bones and i call it electricity

can you try to understand why i don't want to live like this
and i don't know how to change
i don't even want to get better because i don't know who i am outside this cage
i constructed every piece from scratch and i think it's the only thing i ever made
did i get this from my father?
sometimes i think we're more alike than i'd like to believe
we just hide different kinds of scars under our sleeves

but please don't hate me
if i finally finally leave

I hate when you leave the toilet seat up
Or how you spill toothpaste over the sink
I hate finding your clothes hung over furniture
And how you sleep pushed up against my back
Radiating your heat all through the night
I hate even more waking and realizing you're gone
I still can't bring myself to erase the signs of you
It's been a hundred and twenty days since you left
A hundred and twenty days since I last saw you
A hundred and twenty days since I touched you
I remember staying up late at night
You said you'd travel to the most distant places
With or without me
I never thought you'd actually do it
A hundred and twenty days since you left
I still feel you pushed up against me at night
And I wake to an empty spot on the bed
With a matching pain in my heart
While grief is the only one I wake up to
A hundred and twenty days since your death

the words. don't. come.
so e as ily
these _ days
not so much <at all>
whatdoihavetosay
[when] she is no longer
^listen^ing^ ^^
}}wooden}} {{chimes{{
cl _an _ k  around
like her° name° in° my° head°
& her-voice-in-my-chest
₩hen you've had her
in your skin\ \ bones\ \ breath
once she's.             gone.....
what's.    really.
¿left.

Lucita clearly wasn't a beauty.
Her grade school features were unrefined,
Awkward, plain, unattractive….
(I'm trying not to be unkind.)

Her classmates loved--as many kids do--
To find people's faults and then make fun of them.
Lucita's classmates tormented her;
I know because I was one of them.

I didn't say mean things about her,
Tease her or call her a horrible name.
My silence, however, made me complicit;
Because of my silence, I shared their shame.

How often are we silent when
We see injustice right before us?
Do we fear becoming involved
Or hope that the "evil" will ignore us?

History shows what happens to people
When others stay silent and don't speak out.
Only by standing up to injustice
Can real change come about.

Lucita didn't stay long at the school.
I think her family moved away.
I'm sure the kids found someone else
To taunt, belittle, pester, and flay.

I hope that for Lucita a happy,
Fulfilling life has been her reward;
I hope the once gawky duckling
Opened her beautiful wings and soared.

- by Bob B