The boy who is afraid of heights
Takes orders through a metal box
And once he grew his hair out into
Those dark curls I despise
He found all the ways to haunt my daydreams and nightmares alike

The skinny boy with glasses
Got contacts a year later
He swims for miles and miles
And searches inside himself for the truth of whose hand to hold
Although the he once held mine every day

The boy with dark skin and lovely laughter
Will probably never grow up
He will probably always search for a girl's approval
And will continually lose that girl in the end
But he will be sure to make her smile

The boy who carved a cross into his skin
He thought he understood me and could fix me
But he could barely understand himself
And he barely hugged me
Even though he wanted to

The boy who plays bass
Will probably never be my boyfriend
But he's done more for me than all of them
Combined
He makes me question reality, love, life, myself
He jokes around with me and keeps me honest
He holds my hand and lets me cry and makes me laugh
He urges me to go on and to be happy
And he will always be there to do so

And I just wonder
If you ask yourself
"Is she doing okay?"
Do you assume no news is good news?
Do you think
"Well, she isn't ******* to me about how unfair and pathetic her life is
So she must not want to jump from the top of her building anymore"
Or is it much more simple:
You just don't think about me

they don't mean a **** thing
it's just words, decisions
made outside of my head
which, interestingly enough, is where the problem is rooted
these "risk factors" i supposedly show
what do they really, honestly signify?
that i'm mental, incompetent, a danger to myself?
words that a man in his fifties can scribble onto a piece of paper
and hand off to another man in his fifties
and it means the same thing across the board
because they apparently know what i'm thinking
how i'm feeling
they can see by the fact that i can't get out of bed most days
that i'm depressed
they know that because i hyperventilate over due dates and social situations
that i have generalized anxiety disorder
they conjecture that because i don't hesitate before crossing the main street on campus
i'm at a very high risk for suicide
i suppose none of these are far-off guesses
but my brain is not a textbook
and my thoughts are not teaching material
i am not a simple headcase!
i will not be simplified and generalized into the little boxes you've charted out
"here's where the depressed kids go"
"bipolar disorder falls here"
"eating disorders go in this corner to the left"
"watch the ones who want to **** themselves closely"
"it'll probably be a big show"
my thoughts, feelings, actions are not so easily categorized
yes, i've taken psychology
i know that freud claimed we're all acting on pent-up ****** rage
i know that skinner put rats in a box and thus proved behaviorism
i know that all of these men, they wrote papers and did experiments on how it's all inside our unconsciousness
my unconscious
i am not so easily uncovered
i refuse to put myself in a tiny box and let someone else dictate what is going on in my head just so he can receive a paycheck
i won't let someone pump xanax and prozac into me like it's nothing
i want to know that i'm not just going through a rough patch
i want to be certain that something is broken before i start fixing it
**** me or repair me
all i know is i won't go down without a fight

You fall asleep knowing
How much I adore you
And I fall asleep convinced
There isn't a single person that wants me around

a constant struggle
between being alive
and wanting to die

the
quiet
times
are
always
when
the
demons
claw
their
way
out

and you could rip apart
every
last
piece of me
but i would still see the sun in your eyes
the world in your smile
and the universe in your heart