Sitting here in class I am today, minding my business as they would say. I’m listening to the teacher teach but hearing only things left beyond my reach. Another whole day in this **** school so I can come out each night 'more-of-a-fool,' and would it behoove them all to know, I ain’t no dummy, no 'coffee-Joe'?

  …but then I’d have to get the chance, the opportunity provided to advance and the equal treatment they all receive that somehow has been lost on me. Why do I even come here? Why does my Mom insist on this? They don’t call on me, care about me, acknowledge me, it’s ridiculous. At lunch each day I gotta use my fists and even my own kind acts wicked, cause for the rest of them fighting is all that exists.

  Exists; having objective reality or being.

  I exist alright; exist if you call this a life, defined by ******, **** and monkey, or related to some stupid-actin’ ****** or some dumb brawler or that dude good at running but never ever seen as intelligent and cunning. The girls ignore me, teachers too, white guys hate me, what did I do? What did I ever do to them? I’m just like you, I just want some friends, want the chance in life to succeed, man shut up about being freed that **** happened a hundred and fifty ******* years ago, I’m just as sick of hearing about it as you are 'Bro.'

  They say I have rights, they say that it’s fair, they say there’s a chance for me everywhere, but everywhere I look that’s not what I see, I’m put-down and degraded cons-tant-ly, told that I should join the team, or passed over in conversations about some thing. Forced to be friends with thugs that hate but to them at least I can relate, for just like me they was excluded or marginalized when told that they are deluded; they’ll never make it anyway, never achieve their dreams, never have their say so why even bother when no one cares how you feel, when your dreams in life won’t ever be real, when you end up in the streets and all you got left is to steal, when its still,

“Go back to Africa ******!”

...they say with zeal and the vitriol an violence comport surreal, Helen didn’t hold this secret to reveal nor does rap, truthfully, with these problems deal? Cocooned by stares and ****-sure glares, because your own sports brothers hate your *** and make you just wanna ditch that class, so here I ended up on the streets, hangin' round on my crew’s beats, acting tough, street-cred and clout and there your 'momma-an-sister' out n’ about, while here I am a fresh drop-out and can you guess what?

Here we come to take her purse, I clock your mom’s mouth and shove down your sister but ***** you boy I could’ve done much worse, she could’ve lost her life and come home in a hearse!

  Is this the ****** ya’ll wanted to see? All filled up inside with hatred, cause I was told that I would never make it, from day one got no attention, spent half of high school in afternoon detention, training me for my future as a prison convict yet another sign our society is depraved and sick. Given no chance or help or just some praise, no moments to shine and no Happy Days, he’s just a gang-banger, a **** they say? My actions may be worse than your words assail, and well, that may be me and I may be in jail but here’s something from my Grand Momma, a little encouragement goes a long way to change this drama...

You see me on the street you better ******* run cause you already know what’s in my jacket son and my hoodie will be up so you can’t see my face since I already know what you think of my race.

When someone makes light of Suicide;
they are processing it.

Sorting trauma, understanding
where and how life can begin
despite the pain; can take many forms.

Because how absurd is it to plant
a flower
where a crack splits in the sidewalk?

How absurd to label a
Fault line, a Rainbow?

How dare you mark those imperfect
roadways others deem unsafe to travel
with Beauty, Life and Hope!

How dare you decorate those sign posts
with glitter and streamers so others know
where not to travel!

How dare you reach through the Abyss
and pull something out of it, yea how
dare you let others know what's
really there...

I understand, Suicide is not a joke...
Unless we're both still here laughing
As I say, better to be an ***
who kept on cracking
Than the guy who fell through his
own Rainbows;

An attempt to drown
One's inner demons,
Does nothing more
Than render them
With an ability to swim...

"She suffers with depression".
What do you see right now? In your mind's eye?
I know what you see.
You see a pale, skinny but beautiful girl curled up in their bed all sad and crying into the arms of a parent/lover/friend.
Let me tell you something.
That's not what it looks like.
Depression is not romantic.
That girl hasn't showered for three days. Her room smells. Her hair is greasy and unkempt.
She isn't crying. She's binge eating while watching TV episodes into the night.

When I close my eyes, it's like stepping into a whole new world. White flecks in the darkness flash green and blue, the blackness bleeds red and I feel the sun warming denim. It makes me feel as though I'm at a standstill. Like this is a dream, a form of aesthetic that isn't quite my flavor and I have no place but an intrusion.

I hear wind chimes in the far distance, like a sparkle made up of sound waves and I suddenly wonder if the neighbors down the street are feeling this way as well. Or if it's just a fantasy, if this world is just a daydream away and we're the blurred figures we never remember but always see, like how people from dreams are real life people you've seen before. I like to imagine ourselves as those people, forgotten but lingering in the mind of whoever is staring down at us, if there is one anyway.

I find it easy to breathe: no weight down my chest or numbness crawling up my esophagus. My leg is swinging, my eyes are scanning and I should be enjoying this day like a normal person should.

But I'm not. Not because my heart is slowing down or that my mind is pulling me apart but because I know that whatever I do there is a filter that blocks me. Because even if I act happy and normal there's still a screen between us, made up of stigma and prejudice. Because I'm me.

I hear a baby's cry, ebbing into laughter and I wonder if I can be that innocent, that happy again. If I can be content with my life.

I smile sadly. "No."

Call me "druggie" or any other name you want
I am more than the degenerate society sees
Quick to be cold, they don't know who I am
Toss insults around like leaves in the breeze

I tried to make people understand
Staring is not the correct way to learn
Lack of caring, disrespectful looks
Is all an addict will earn

Show me one person who has never been down
Has no mistakes to hold
Demons find their way into all of us
Life leaves the warmest hearts cold

Things taken in different strides
Each person handles pain in their own way
Some stand ground, others escape
Sense of self-worth is the price we pay

Because of you, the stigma you spread
I found how harshly most judge
I want to educate ignorant masses
Their opinions too rigid to budge

I am finally being forced to deal
with limitations, my mind has set.

So, what does that mean?
I spent a life of heavy determination, littered with no’s
Fighting my body while it screamed that I’d do it anyway.
And I did.
I was astounding, gregarious,
Fearless.
Momentum passed brain chemistry.

This ‘no’ is different.
And it’s lingering
And it hurts.
There is no work harder and achieve.
There is no scream and endure.
There is no getting around this.

No one cares if I get stable
No one cares if I medicate.
It’s a no, that stays a ‘no’
No matter if I promise to change.


I deal
and I have no choice,
but to pull my head out of falling embers.
This residual loss, I watch
my dream as it shatters.
Fading flames can’t catch my attention.
Barely an adult,
and I am carrying around a life sentence.

Chained by self-doubt
In a dungeon of in-betweens
Barred from moving to either side
Stuck motionless in the seam

A wearisome place where all the "I don't
know's" and "I don't care's" lose any voice at all
So monotonous that individualism and
opinions cannot break through the prison
walls

Complacency will start to settle in
By becoming increasingly comfortable within
the rut
Unless intervention allows a glimpse beyond
the despair
That entices the healing of a fearful gut

Undo my buttons
and let the soul breathe
for the body to freeze
or scorch! I am done
with each attempt to see
with wistful bras
and weeping knickers
Sulked by sore heads
that lay on pvc pillows
And aluminium beds
Mouths that drink blood
chew mud
Lips that never kissed the moonlight
Eyes that never waved to the sunbeam
All talk of love to redeem
this mass of jagged insanity
“La vie est un sommeil,
l'amour en est le rêve."
Undo my buttons
and caress all the scars
it took to believe
I am as dead
as my cigars.