Everybody talks about depression as if they know it.
Like they can feel the blood dripping down their skin,
And they know the sick thought of "Oh -- look how beautiful the red is."
(They always say red is my color.)

As if they laid on their bed for hours on end,
Salt tracks lining their face like the scars on their ankles,
Because tears just won't come anymore.
As if they know staring at their ceiling, tracing patterns in the paint
And thinking "Maybe if I stay here awhile longer, I'll go away --
I'll cease to exist" because they're past the point of suicidal thoughts --
Accepting death in life with this hole in their chest and thinking
Death is a reward, an escape from this pain I deserve to feel.

I know depression. The kind that goes unnoticed --
The kind that takes the metal from a hair tie and not cuts --
But scrapes at the skin on her arm, lying on her bed,
Tears not yet dried up with a mother screaming "MONSTER"
Outside of her door.
I know the kind that cuts on her ankles, not her wrists,
Because she's scared she'll get in trouble but she
Desperately needs to be seen.
And never is.

I know depression. The kind that stops cutting because
She gives up hope that she ever will be.
The kind that accepts being alone, that accepts the pain
Like a gift because she deserves it -- that didn't smile for a year,
That went so far into herself that she forgot what connection was like
Not that she ever knew in the first place because

I know a depression that's always been there.
That started some time before the age of 10 but
She can't remember because the monster inside her chest
Stole those years, those memories.
And that monster took the place of every connection she might have felt --
Stopped it, muted it, because it wanted to be her sole companion.
So it was, and has been for 19 years.

And no one ever knew. Or --
They did, but they'd call her crazy.
Demented. Pathetic. A creep. Tell her she had no right --
That because she had a family, a home, money, whatever,
Because of this, her pain was irrelevant.
Fake - selfish - vain - wrong - she hadn't earned it -
So no one cared.

I know that depression.

I wish that you could have my heart-
in its entirety
I wish that you could have my heart-
but I'm keeping it for me
See, I gave someone my heart before-
but he went and gave it back
Yes, I gave a boy my heart before-
but the ******* turned it black.

We lay in bed, the only place I know him-
Wrapped in each other, legs a tangled heap-
Still sweaty, we are perpetually sweaty-
And he holds me with a tenderness I haven't seen before.

It is these times that we speak French-
During *** he speaks German, I do not know what he says-
But it sounds angry, and I like that.
Afterwards we speak French, the language of love-
and I tell him I'm in love-
but not with him.

I tell him I'm in love with a man thousands of miles away-
who cannot hold me.
And I trace the scars on his arm with my fingertip-
White lines that stand-out against the glistening black of his skin-
Which spell out a name that is not mine
and I know that he still loves her-
Because he tells me.

He pushes my hair behind my ear, and kisses me on the forehead.
It's a gentle kiss, not meant for me-
he knows I like it rough-
But I close my eyes and pretend the lips belong to someone else.
We pull eachother closer.

The pixels of the letters-
That flowed from his beautiful mind
Through his fingertips-
Glow, as though each was a small angel
Descended from heaven
With a message, just for me
That was read with eyes blinded
By hopes and expectations.

But all the pixelated angels in in the world
Could not make up for the smile
That refused to reach his eyes
Which always seemed so cold,
And never quite reached mine.

He was a monster,

but I did not know.


Sleeping.

   I poked.

One eye.

   Prodded.

Two eyes.

   The monster woke,

And so I ran. Too late,

He ate my soul.


I was a monster,

but I did not know.

You inhale oxygen while I inhale strife;
Breathing to keep living but it slowly ends my life.
You say that it will **** me, and I do not disagree;
So hold your breath
And bite your tongue;:
While I breathe misery.

I met a girl with fire on her head and in her heart,
Her arms were lined perfectly with the reaper's scythe.
She was beautiful, but she didn't know it.
And isn't that the story,
A sad, beautiful little thing saved by a shining knight,
Because no one cares unless you're beautiful or dying.
I am neither.
So where do I belong?
A young woman, never graced by lips in pure adoration,
The last time I was kissed was
Only because he wanted me to **** his **** and
Even then I was only a rebound because
I am never first.
First? No-
I'm that weird girl at a frat party with
A beer in her hand and nobody to dance with,
No one to make out with unless the guy who asked
Was already rejected by everybody else.
I'm that awkward friend who always
Stands off a little to the side because
I never know what to say.

When I was a little girl, I wrote a poem.
I called it second best, because
I knew my parents' pride wasn't me.
How could it be, standing in the shadow of a
Prom king, football playing, religious, outgoing,
Straight-A, straight-laced son?
I mean, sure, they loved me but
What is love, really?
Can't anyone tell me? Because I'm sitting inside this
Bricked up wall, Invisible to the passerby,
They pass on by, pass me by, can't they see me cry?
No, this wall is too **** high-
Just like the last guy.
And so, I was dead before I was born.
What a cold heart, I'm never warm.
I found the world, but it was broken.
I found love, but it was wasted
Like the last man I tasted.

So, tonight I'm writing a poem
And I'm calling it second best because that?
Is what I am.

Love is not a drug
Because that would imply that
Love is a bad thing