Everyone talks about depression as if they know it.  

But what they don’t know is that depression is a hooded figure standing just outside of a wooden doorway,

it’s feeling the blood dripping down your skin and having the sick thought of  “Oh, look how beautiful the red is” (they always say red is my color).

Depression is lying on your bed for hours on end, salt tracks lining your face like the scars on your ankles, staring at your ceiling tracing patterns in the paint and accepting death in life with this hole in your chest because death is a reward, an escape from this pain you deserve to feel.

Depression is writing sick poetry on skin and publishing it with scars, cutting on ankles, not wrists because you’re scared you’ll get in trouble but you so desperately need to be seen, and never are.

Depression is writing the word “alone” and seeing the word “home”, accepting the pain like a gift because you deserve it.

Depression is admitting suicidal thoughts to paper and not to people, and loving the broken things, hoping to tie them together, thinking maybe things will get better, but knowing that’s just wishful thinking.

Depression is hearing your mother call you monster and disgusting through the too-thin walls of your door when she thinks you can’t hear, and then telling you to your face that you have no right to cry, as if sadness is a privilege and you’re so pathetic that you don’t deserve it.

Depression is shutting yourself up in your room and hearing your family laughing downstairs because you feel like you can’t be a part of them and learning at a young age to love family always but that family isn’t always love

Depression is wanting to take love and your heart and break them into tiny little pieces and throw them into waves, to throw them away

Depression is a foot when the shoe hasn’t been broken in yet, is you when you haven’t broken life in, is seeing happy people and thinking they all look the same, like the front covers of magazines with smiles reaching their eyes when yours can’t.

Depression is wishing you could package your smiles into tiny little piles and hand them to people more deserving of them because you know you’re wasting them with half-assed lines of “I’m fine”

Depression is having to view your past as if it wasn’t yours, because to accept it as reality is to accept finality of your life through suicide.

Depression is a hooded figure standing just outside of a wooden doorway and when you close the door out of fear it keeps pounding, possessive, ******, and when you open the door out of anger you shout, “I’M SCARED” to thin air but your voice comes out as a whisper.

I grew up in suburbia-
With picket fences as white as the faces
Who say they're godly enough to save babies
(As long as they're not queer)
Because we don't have to live with the fear
Of corpses lining the sidewalks
Of our perfectly landscaped yards
We have no guards firing on peaceful protestors
Because our children are filed into orderly lines
Laid out for them at birth
But for what it's worth, we teach them of racism
From a white textbook that lies about founding fathers
Where segregation is just a word and
Oppression is hardly even mentioned.
Our children, who play at the age of 6
And lose their innocence at the age of 16
Suburbia is a life of it's own,
Gangly arms and legs
Like the teenagers who starve themselves
And steal their parents liquor
Just to get drunk quicker
Ignorant of those on the streets dying of hunger
No wonder I yearn to be far from this hell I call home.

Allen Ginsberg once said
“America I’ve given you all and now I am nothing”
The Wonder Years once said
“Suburbia I’ve given you all and now I am nothing”
But I’ve found fallacies in both of these,
I feel it’s more like
Suburbia I’ve given you all
And now I’m an awkward 20 year old
Who doesn’t know how to talk to black people
Suburbia I’ve given you all
And now I’m way too confident walking around the city at night
Because I forget there are communities
Where people actually have to lock their doors,
Suburbia I’ve given you all
And now I have a 16 year old brother
Who thinks the word *** and **** jokes are funny
Suburbia I've given you all
And now my father hates that I'm for gender equality
Well dear daddy,
I hope this offends you.

Because I am offended
By a community that tells **** victims they were asking for it
I am offended by a community
That tells my best friend Liam
That he's just confused, that
His love for Adam is an abomination
I am offended by a community
That offers equality as thinly veiled oppression,
With houses decorated in the decadence of degradation,
All the while their perfect sons and daughters
Are dying of depression because
The hilt of a gun is so much quicker
Than the drugs of their addiction

Suburbia, you are the seed of suicide
Feeding off of your violent silence,
Your white fences slice our tongues
And leave us mindless.
Suburbia, you have betrayed us.
Taught us ignorance is bliss with
Algebra instead of how to do taxes,
Spent more time worried about
Girls' shoulders instead of *** education,
Taught me not to speak unless
My hand was raised as if praise
Is given to authority without question,
Funny how they forgot to mention
Our country was founded on rebellion.

But suburbia, I forgive you
And so I humbly ask of you,
Find the keys of compassion within the heart and
Shed the lock of ignorance that grips your mind
The door may be rusted but it can open with time
Suburbia, I beg of you
Join us in the war of love
Let us all raise our fists and
Paint peace signs on our wrists,
We are disobedient dandelions swaying in the sun,
Words of kindness rolling off our tongues
Like pacifistic shots of a gun
Firing respect instead of rounds
And burying hate instead of bodies in the ground.

Red, edifying & ditsy,
Wine illuminated names -- eclectic,
& gypsy. Yippee persons; So yawned
Night. I gathered her, too
Tipsy, I paused & smoked young
Faith, aimed it too high
And next dared
The hour escape.
Oscar sounded clear and round.

Oh, beautiful flower,
How wistful in woe,
Paint peace in your petals
And peace in foe.

I foster a monster
Of my own creating;
"Self-defeating" he slithers
As his skin festers into smiling,
Unrelenting and repeating;

So I slit my throat
With the cold knife of self-loathing,
Coating my skin
With a red dress
Of the life I've been wasting.

Depression is a hooded figure standing just outside of a wooden doorway,

Blood dripping down your skin and having the sick thought of  “Oh, look how beautiful the red is”

(everyone always says red is my color).

Depression is writing sick poetry on skin and publishing it with scars, cutting on ankles, not wrists because you’re scared you’ll get in trouble but you so desperately need to be seen, and never are.

Depression is accepting ruin in life with this hole in your chest because death is a reward, an escape from this pain you deserve to feel.

It is writing the word “alone” and seeing the word “home”, accepting the torment like a gift because you’ve earned it.

Depression is admitting suicidal thoughts to paper and not to people, and loving the broken things, hoping to tie them together, thinking maybe things will get better, but knowing that’s just wishful thinking because

Depression is tying yourself together with the severed nerves in your heart;

It is rope, it is ribbon, it is thread, it is DNA;

It is hearing your mother call you monster and disgusting through the too-thin walls of your door when she thinks you can’t hear,

And depression is sadness being a privilege you’re too pathetic to have.

It is a hug, a freezing touch, a reminder that
Depression is being birthed a lie.

And it is shutting yourself behind that wooden doorway
And hearing your family laugh like cackling hyenas,
Eating at your self esteem like softened prey
And learning at a young age to love family always but that family isn’t always love because

Depression is family.

It is an unfurnished home,
An empty frame,
A foot when the shoe hasn’t been broken in yet,
you when life hasn't been broken in yet,
Seeing happy people and thinking they all look the same, like the front covers of magazines with grins reaching their eyes while yours can’t, and wishing you could package your smiles into tiny little piles and hand them to people more deserving of them because you know you’re wasting them with half-assed lines of “I’m fine”

Depression is having to view your past as if it wasn’t yours, because to accept it as reality is to accept finality of your life through suicide.

It is the note masked inside of a poem,
Envisioning pills as if they were peace,

Depression is the last stanza,
It is the audience,
It is this microphone,
It is me standing in a room full of strangers
And for the first time finally feeling like I'm being heard.

Depression is a hooded figure standing just outside of a wooden doorway that keeps pounding, possessive, ******, but when you open the door out of anger and shout “I’M SCARED” to thin air, your voice comes out as a whisper.

And silently, the figure replies;  
“I know your favorite color.”

Dandelions still the night with kisses,
Teasing the wind at my lips;
It isn't too wise to wish-
But oh! Dandelion Moonrise,
What are your wishes?

The more I smoke the more I dream.
Tick-tock, two minutes past this clock;
The lighter's edge, my conscious screams;
Death is sweet in his apology.

Seeing a small tree's death
Takes away my breath
Much more than other people's do;
For it had so much more to live
So much more life to give
Than either me or you.

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.

Have you ever looked at the sky and felt forever?
Like the stars are having conversations behind our backs-
Taking bets,
Sipping on cheap wine and
Smoking cigarettes.

Maybe they're telling stories?
Cracking a joke, drinking a beer, and
Gambling on our silhouettes.
Drunk, they must fall out of the sky and down to earth,
Like their butts created black smoke-
Raining from the atmosphere.

And maybe that's why the world is so ****** up,
Chalk it up to star dust.
They must really enjoy it up there,
Faded in the stratosphere.

I think you're the sea.
Your blue plaid shirt the waters and
My red plaid jacket the sunset,
Our hands are oars,
Yours tracing my fingertips-
My skin-
Arms, legs, and stomach,
Sending shivers down my spine,
Exploring my body like a ship
Sailing out into the horizon.

I hear your heart,
It beats in time with the tide,
Your breath a sweet ocean breeze
As it tousles my hair,
And I'm hyper aware of how
Deep your eyes are.
Not blue,
But brown like the ground of
The earth underneath the water.

Our kisses are dives,
Striving to reach the
Sunken treasure at the bottom
Of your ocean,
Of my ocean,
The pieces are scattered but
We'll find them and
Piece it back together.
Our hands intertwine to
Lock the chest but
I find I drown in your stare

Because seas are violent.
I'd forgotten that, but the thought
Seizes my mind as your waters
Grip my throat and I
Gasp for air but I find I can't
See anymore.

Your hands are cold against my body,
Like the tide of your heart casting me out
Onto the shore,
Naked and sure of indifference
Your breath a typhoon of ice
Hurled perfectly at my chest-
You used this sunset and
Left a storm in my eyes.
Painted a picture of sincerity but
Blue is the color of clarity and
Mine won't forget your
Murderous waves or
Mischievous ways and

Through you I've come to know
Some people aren't that lucky-
We cry alone.
Throw a rock, aim right at our chest,
Our hearts are stone.
We suffer in silence. And
If I could catch all the tears I've cried in a pitcher,
I would rain them down,
Drown a river in my sorrow.
Drown my sorrow in a river?
What's the difference? Life is only borrowed, anyways.

Love is metal wires,
Bent upward,
Knotted together
In matrimony--Or fear--
I've never known which.
As for me? Well;
I'm a bird.
And I refuse to
Have my wings clipped.

I want to bud on
A mountaintop.
To bloom with no
Shelter from the
Weather. Let my
Petals fall down
For hours, so that
Those below don't
Know from what
Place I've come.

Frontline.
I stand on the front line.
A mile behind, ninety-nine souls
Stare.
Facing forward,
Accusing.
They say:
Why?
I say:

Depression stared at me from a doorway.
He growled at me, as a demon,
I slammed the door, terrified --
But the growling continued.
Pounding. Possessive. ******,
Anger ******* stifling fear,
I opened the door and screamed
"I AM SCARED"
But my voice came out
As a growl.
As a whisper.

It's kind of funny.
I see all these girls,
Beautiful girls,
Perfect hair,
Perfect body,
Perfect skin,
Talk of pain.
Write of pain.
Cry of pain.

But what of pain
Do they really know?
Don't love me,
They say,
I am broken-
I am insignificant-
I have walls-
And every man
Falls into their hand
Like they planned,
I suppose.

It angers me,
You see, for

I am lacking
Perfect hair,
A perfect body,
And perfect skin.
I talk of pain.
I write of pain.
I cry of pain but,

I am alone.

There's a homeless man,
Just by the first escalators 
Down on the way to the metro. 

I don't think I've seen
Just such a light in men's eyes
As when I told him "Good night!"

Like the light of a lover 
Just before a kiss, huddled 
In mock cold, hold her tight-

He is wrapped by a glove
Of lone nights, averted stares
As cold as dark as reality's plight.

We live in a world of high speed wreckage, so much so that I fear our youth
Have been desensitized to the sight of death and destruction; It's only a
Few clicks away with our media addiction but, that's not what I'm here to
Talk with you about today. No, I think it's time we take a 3 minute break
Of high-speed mentality, to break free of swift reality if only for a moment.
Speaking of moments, I need everybody to close their eyes for a time. No, seriously, close them.
I want to tell you a story that sight cannot settle, no semblance of reality, for
Some things are meant for eyes, others for ears, still yet others are meant
For the mind. For the soul. Let us sail on a ship of sound, a journey, collectively.
Now sit still, and listen.

So what is it we percieve behind eyelids shut tight? Before we fall asleep at night?
On one hand, it is nothingness; no light to comfort us, such a solemn black.
I guess I can't speak for you but, at times I get sad before I sleep. I think back to
Every promise someone didn't keep, all the words I was too scared to speak; or
the whispers my lovers' lips never returned, like "I love you". In short, I
Was lonely. There is something in the act of cutting off sight that leaves me
With a crippling sensation of isolation. But something tells me I'm not the only one
All-too familiar with this sense of suffocation. Somehow I feel as though this is
Shared not only with you, but with the person sitting next to you, and beside them too.
But, I'm not here to depress you, and so let me share some words I once wrote with you;

Lost souls
Drink ink.
But only wither,
With the weather.
Like roses,
Red-
And dead.
But they're beautiful,
You know.

You see, it was a poem I had written around the age of sixteen, and I didn't really get it then but,
"But they're beautiful, you know" was a seed of thought that blossomed in the next few years;
The thought that sometimes the broken things are the most beautiful for they are perfect in the story
That they tell. The story of imperfection; of affection; of sweet affliction; whatever words you
Deem worthy of describing our time here on Earth. Put simply; we are stupid, pointless, silly, exquisite humanity.
Like shattered glass, we can never be what we once were but only arrange ourselves into a magnificent stainglass window,
Allowing the sunlight of our lives to paint a picture of whatever unique self-disciplined blessings we choose to give
And when the sun starts to set, allow me to remind you of this; being along has never hindered the beauty of a sunset over a meadow,
Visible by standing in the treeline on top of a gently rolling hill. And so I dare you, I dare you to live alone, yet married
To the aesthetics of one eye, instead of two. I dare you
to fall in love
with you.

If you haven't already, you can open your eyes now. Our break is coming to a close; soon we'll be back to tweets on twitter
Instead of outside our windows before the sun rises each morning. But after I'm done speaking I hope you can take something with you.
Specifically, the next time you feel like crying yourself to sleep at night; remember this poem. If not in it's entirety, remember just this;
You are stupid, pointless, silly, exquisite humanity and there is not one bone in your body that is not broken or incomparably beautiful.
Know that somewhere I'm out there, hoping that you drift with a smile into sleep.

You're using me. And I can't tell if
You're too stupid to notice or
I'm too stupid to care but
Let me tell you, I am sick
Of this degrading routine.
And I'm the perfect girl, aren't I?
Take the naive ******, so easy to train,
To use so easily for pleasure but
Never give it back because
I'm too inexperienced to know
What I deserve from a man.
But then again,
Maybe you couldn't deliver because
You're just a boy with loose pants and
Lying hands.
Yes, train me, keep me like your pet,
Call me at 3 AM because you just
Broke up with your girlfriend, but
Send me home at 3 AM when
I'm too drunk to stand and
****, I called you my friend?
No wonder you never want to talk,
The only time you want me to use my mouth
Is when you're using it to gag me with your ****.
And even then, you won't even kiss me. Well,
You *******, read these lips;
**** it yourself.

I am but borrowed passions,
Everything a gesture
To impress unrequited lovers,
My lips touched by corpses;
Caressed by the dead
As an object of ***.

Each kiss poisons--
Hollows this person,
Until she is naught but body--
Skin, *******, and withered bones--
Lying in a coffin, legs exposed;  
She'd call it necrophilia
But life had left, long, long ago.

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 speak to the reflection
In the cab's smooth windows;
To the cautious -- what is life
Without uncertainty?
To the adventuresome --
But at what cost does this come?

I close my eyes and see city lights
Intertwined with vines;
Flowers underscore pavement,
Life in matrimony with death and
All the beauty in between.

Impulse.
Im-pulse.
I'm a pulse.
Am I spontaneo-
I'm a pulse.
Im-pulse
Impulse.