I think when we describe our depression,
we tend to leave out the
less romantic parts.
We paint images of us crying in the shower
and lying awake at night.
But we skip the parts
that don't look quite as nice.

Like, that time you
smiled at everyone
on the way down the street
but as soon as you
reached the cross walk,
your ears began to ring.
And here you were,
holding your arms
across your ribs,
thinking,
"You're just exhausted.
Let the cars stop moving.
People are watching."
I guess it's just not
as beautiful as that other stuff.

Perhaps the difference
between reading depression
in a poem,
and seeing depression
in a person,
is like the
difference between
watching someone smoke
a cigarette at a cafe in a film,
and watching someone smoke
a cigarette at a street corner
on your way to class.

Art shows us the pretty spiraling
smoke that forms above the smoker's skull
but it skips the deep cough that
plagues her just a moment later.

So, as it goes,
everyone wants to love
that interesting
and stunning
broken soul
Everyone wants
to be the one
that gives that lost
wanderer
a home
But as soon as
they realize,
broken means
shattered
It means
glass pieces
that will cut you
and tears that
will rush over
your floodgates and
soak you completely through
They want to run away...

Kinda like the kid who
saw that gorgeous hipster
smoking in
some *******
indie film,
inhaled a cigarette
of his own,
felt the sting
of clean lungs
as they fill with smoke
& put it out...

They'll taste the
pain on your lips
and put you out

That's how you know,
they're not looking
to know you
They just wanna say
they healed you