Conflict is trauma promoting trauma
Conflict is love becoming blind to one's inner beauty
Conflict is wasting moments of growth
Conflict is hating self, and showing others how much you hate self
Conflict is aborting peace as you choose to birth evil

i love my dad
you do not see it
but that's the way
it is

three hour van silences
are no longer
awkward

i am the scion of 4
that's never going to greet him

i know a child
scratches his belly from the inside

i'm in the house of mirrors
while everyone is eating
i see through the
teasing, the
shouting
mom shakes her head "no one
can ever talk to you"
i see
through
the
pain

my silence as a message:
67 years no longer let you
rush to climb the stairs
to embrace the plush worm
of colors: i do it for you

i do not greet you
but i dress a shirt
with the caption "DADS"
and a picture of us two.

You can’t see a thing.
No matter how wide you open your eyes,
Or squint in concentration,
You can’t see anything.

You can move,
Yes, you stagger around blindly,
And don’t come into contact with anything.
There is nothing here…
Just darkness.
And you.

That is what it feels like
In your mind,
When you are so depressed
That waking up is like a punch in the stomach.
Because you know you have to get through another day.

Of torture.
Of aching hopelessness.
In a life that you don’t know why you are living.

Your very EXISTENCE
Has become the main source of pain.
And with a razor in one hand,
And blood running down the other,
You stare at the wound thinking
"I feel nothing."

Blood just becomes a colour,
Wounds just become a place for a bandage.
There is no pain in it.
Because no amount of physical pain can bring you out of the pain in your own head.

You are totally alone.
You scan the bright eyes and alive faces of the people around you.
Look at them,
All on cloud nine,
And they don’t even know it.

They think nothing of smiling,
Of laughing,
They don’t notice the happiness that flows throughout them.

They look at everything they see
Like they WANT to see it.
Like they welcome the light into their eyes.

Every step they take is powerful,
It resonates with the energy that they have,
The will to live in their every stride…
While you cannot lift your foot off the ground.

So tonight,
Like all other nights,
You are on a planet on your own.
A world filled with torment
And trapped in the terrors of your own head.

You might get the skipping rope out of the garden shed,
You might tip pills onto the edge of the sink
And think
"I WISH I WAS DEAD."

You might regret being born,
Or living at all,
Or think "I should have done this a long time ago."

Hang on one second. Please.
What is one second more?
Especially when this second
Could change everything.

That abyss you are stuck in…
You aren’t alone in there.
You can’t see them, but there are others here.

All you have to do is shout out.
Scream for help,
Shout it from the rooftops,
Tell them all "I don’t want to live anymore."

And in a crowd,
One, even just one,
Will push their way to the front,
And hold out their hand,
And say "me too."

A tiny flame of light will appear in the thick darkness
And give you air.
Make you feel like you aren’t drowning…

Wouldn’t that be a nice feeling?

Of COURSE you aren’t alone!
Of COURSE you aren’t the only person in the world that wants out.

But suicide doesn’t end pain.
All it does is pass it on to someone else.

So put the rope back in the shed,
And lock the door.

Tip the pills back in the ***,
And shut the cabinet behind you.

Crawl, if you have to,
Across your floor.
Shed all the tears you never shed.

Scream in hysterics,
All the frustration you swallowed down,
Let it out.

The LOUDER you are,
The less alone you become.

Dial that number.
Maybe it’s 116 123.
There will be a voice at the end of the phone.

It is there to give you a lantern in the darkness.
And soon enough…
The whole world will be lit up…
And you will see light again…