"drapetomania" poems
Today I had an emotional breakdown
In front of a thirteen year old
I told her that I just wanted to run away
That I experienced the feeling
Drapetomania
An overwhelming urge to run away
I declared that all I wanted to do with my life
Was to live in a cottage with the Love of my life
Read books and live serenely
I don't want stress
I don't want this terrible nonsense
Called 'matric'
And to beg for bursaries from the man with money
For a job I may not even enjoy
I just want to be happy
I want to be loved
I want to caress the world with my writing in books
And touch individuals with profound poetry
Why must I go on with stress
Why oh why
Must life for an eighteen year old be
Oh so difficult
I just want to be happy
I want to run away
To my cottage in the mountains
Where my quiet symphony reigns.
Jul 19, 2016
Jul 19, 2016 at 3:59 PM UTC
( Poem follows below after this short introduction) So this is a warning for anyone who believes in mental illness & thinks that psychiatry is helping them rather than harming them & to remind them how it is a potentially dangerous tool for oppression & medicalization of normality. In 1850, a US Doctor came up with this diagnosis to claim that slaves that wanted to run away/ran away were mentally ill because he a) believed black people were inferior to white people b) that any desire in a black person to be free must be mental illness as they were born to be enslaved. I am not kidding. This really happened.
Drapetomania
So you see it has a name
this singing in my veins
the wish to be free of my chains
is apparently insane
for by my skin I was born to serve
those who would whip me
those who would trick me
of my birth right
to stand free in the sun
No, apparently, if I run
I am sick
tell me quick
doc what do I do
& tell me how do
you sleep at night
being so cruel
to your fellow man
is there a name for what
you do, I could think of a few
I can only come up with
' Bullshit'
Jul 13, 2015
Jul 13, 2015 at 6:33 PM UTC
They all hate me,
fear of the unknown,
She'll hate me,
wait,
She hates me,
Love,
She'll leave me,
, ask
She doesn't need me,
You need her,
They don't need me,
make them need you,
I should go,
Stay
FOR THEIR SAKE
I thought they loved me,
fake,
I think she loves me,
think back,
I thought she loved me,
infatuation
She said she'll never leave me,
LIES
I need her,
SHE DOESN'T NEED YOU
they WANTED me,
NOT ANYMORE
You said I should stay,
We were wrong
You should go,
FOR OUR SAKE.
Mar 17, 2021
Mar 17, 2021 at 1:42 PM UTC
a dire desire
to flee
to wheel the spine around
and stumble in the opposing direction
quit, split, fly
the physical embodiment of escapism
a towering tsunami
there are only three directions to go:
to face
to exile
to be crushed a statue
a pinched atom
compressed in a chronograph
has a beach still to pour
during here and after now
a glinting ax
to smash the glass
easy
a tug
unlike a leash on a hound's leather collar
great draft horses quarter the prisoner
meat hooks pierce intestines
dismemberment
at its finest
overwhelmed
i run
Jun 15, 2014
Jun 15, 2014 at 7:44 PM UTC
Days turn to eternities
with hindering urgencies
buried inside of me, a
labyrinth of reasoning
alone in the midst, I
refuse
refuse to quit
sawing at the chains anchored
to ankles tied
to this abyss,
caught in a paradox
caught
in a **** whirlwind
gotta break free, 'cuz
drapetomania’s got the best of me.
Jun 14, 2017
Jun 14, 2017 at 12:35 PM UTC
as the thunderclaps bleed the sky
variation of tears
i see you cry with them
and claim that "they have feelings too"
you say that all this time the clouds
have been whispering lullabies with
sodden eyes and cracked voices,
but the world never takes the time
to look up
you feel what others can't
and that is reflected in your gaze-
for your green eyes drip with unsaid
words and whispers
silent,
and comforted by the solitude
you wrap yourself in,
i can see why you revel in your
loneliness
but the storm you're brewing is getting
stronger and,
i don't know a soul who can
handle it-
so why try
Nov 18, 2013
Nov 18, 2013 at 8:52 PM UTC
thoughts racing
wind chasing
caught in the rush
adrenaline
anxiety
heart pounding
leaving
we're finally leaving
past left behind
future never crossing our minds
run
running
we want to go
we want to forget
we want to breathe
set us free
let us go
just let us go
drapetomania
the overwhelming urge to runaway
Oct 1, 2015
Oct 1, 2015 at 8:22 PM UTC
This is the time
To walk at the alley
To ride a bus
To hike
To run
To go.
Dec 20, 2016
Dec 20, 2016 at 7:27 PM UTC
There's a little voice inside my head
Telling me all the places I could be instead
And every day, the more I grow
I yearn and ache to get up and go
I keep on smiling, like I'm having fun
But you have no idea how much I want to run
Apr 29, 2018
Apr 29, 2018 at 10:44 PM UTC