The unimaginable zero summer lies in the water
A water grey with the half-time break
Where mother takes a breath
A breath that sends chills up every nerve ending, even in the tips of fingers
When the sun is a bleached dot in a faded sky
And the evergreen wilts to clay
The sounds of the water hitting sand in the tide
And the rustling of the leaves weaving to make the ceiling
Are no longer welcoming comforts
But detached, careless, and fierce
Any young are burrowed away
A short-notice hibernation with mom and dad and half stock
The black no longer a vast night sky
But a lurking cold beneath pale, cycling feet
That are numb, frozen
Zero

The shower is her therapist -spilling tears all over her body, the way her heart aches to, but her eyes lack to in capacity. She combs her dark hair while she hums an old My Chemical Romance song,

When you go, don't ever think I'll make you try to stay

Gusts of wind come in through the window to remind the foggy glass that it will soon dissipate -that there is a world beyond the dewy structure. She massages the shampoo in her hair with enough strength to try to cleanse away the dirt, and thoughts.

in the morning I'll be off to find another way

She steps out of the shower and wipes off the fog of the double mirror above the sink and stares for a moment and proceeds to grab her tooth brush. Simply brushing her teeth.

The hurt isn't enough anymore to think of it as a metaphor, or anything other than what it is -it's not erasing the taste of him out of her mouth, it's not cleansing away the remains of broken innocence she gave him. That's all over now -he doesn't own that part of her anymore.

a good for nothing, I don't know.

Her face she washes with "Let The Good Times Roll," a face-wash that supposedly smells like caramelized popcorn -she hates popcorn, but she loves the smell of the Lush product; of course, she refuses that it smells anywhere similar to the corn-popped snack.

She throws on a maroon lace bralette and matching skivvies, and slips into an oversized Hanes white t-shirt that she probably purchased at the supermarket as a pack of five, and basks in the feeling of purity and freedom. She looks into the old-fashioned mirror that sits upon her dresser and puts on her retail store bought diamond earrings and $7 Walmart tree necklace and tries to give herself a smile. She's always been one with nature but like an autumn leaf, she drifted wherever the wind, or rather, he would take her. But he's gone now, and the necklace reminds her that she was always rooted -she just expanded her branches a little too far.

I don't love you like I did yesterday.

She takes a seat at her laptop that she worked hard to earn every penny for, and decides she's going to write about this girl she knows, this girl she is falling in love with again. Because even if nobody else does, she see's the beauty in herself -and she deserves to be written down.

And thats the origin of this poem.
NJ2016 [All Rights Reserved]

depression
is an ocean.
at times, it ebbs.
at others it flows.
forever it endures.

depression
is a dead tree.
ripping apart wilted
leaves, adrift
in windswept currents.

depression
is an ant hill.
fit to burst
with activity, but
simultaneously stationary.

depression
is a sword in a stone.
wrest its hilt
to no avail, the blade
remains buried deep.

depression
is a melting glacier.
worn thin by
global warming,
wilting in enervation.

depression
is you and me.
living in the same town
now, but somehow
distant as dimensions.

I took something from you,
sweet stranger
you'll never get it back
the sounds of explosions
that causes the permanent
ringing in your ears
the weight upon your back
the smell of blood piercing your nose
the taste of ammunition
clenched between your teeth
the sight of your men falling to the earth,
never given a second chance
will never fade.
you cannot escape it, my friend
you had no choice
they had no choice
we never get to choose.