After taking a gulp of water, M. opens a new Word document, inhaling deeply. He begins to write a sort of Introduction or Author’s Note:

‘This is to be my first real poem. No *******, cheesy rhyming or painfully forced verbiage. I am now only a seeker of truth…’

M., having just crushed two Focalin pressed pills, rolls a five-dollar bill and proceeds to insufflate, pausing momentarily when the line is halfway finished; he exhales before immediately finishing it off. His sinus burns fiercely. There is something masochistic about his preferred method of ingestion w/r/t pills. And but with a sudden albeit expected (in fact, M. was utterly beholden to it) rush of vitality, M. spends the next ten minutes finishing his half-page poetic manifesto [sic] (which term he actually wrote as a heading. “Poetic Manifesto”, that is), before beginning what he considers to be the first stanza. He likes that the location of the beginning of his poem is ambiguous. And so he begins thusly, consciously avoiding conventional rhyme scheme, instead opting for what he considers to be abstract.

‘My first poem, ostensibly an attempt at catharsis, was in fact a failed expression of my latent desire to be accepted. For today it’s a poem and last week a novel; tomorrow I’ll ferociously ******* some fashionably obscure, formidably pretentious prose [sic]. Consuming all but absorbing nothing…’

If he is to discover vicious truths [sic] in his writing, he cannot hold anything back. He thinks of a double-entendre using the word ‘blunt’, but decides not to employ it. Perhaps yesterday. Suddenly, M. begins to ruminate on his poem from the day before, which had earned him the opposite of acclaim from his peers. He must simply do the opposite of what he had done before! When he resumes writing, M. eventually begins to subconsciously fall back into the 12-syllable AABB rhyme scheme of his yesterday’s poem.

‘…Perhaps the following phase will stick for more than a wretched week.
Why have I wasted words on wan, vapid, wheezing lines
Of sickeningly phony, sophomoric, pseudo-sentimental ****?
Surely you see the salient theme,
That from which I hide,
Refusing to acknowledge life’s flaccid, tan **** as it floats in front of me,
Beckoning me forth,
A one-eyed, furiously fetid viper...’

M. chortles at his alliterative stanza’s ending. ‘This is how I write,’ he mutters to himself, maintaining a straight face. He writes without pause for nearly an hour. He is pleased.

‘…A generalist—that’s what I tell myself I am,
Because simply knowing a few facts,
Even for forty or fifty fields,
Is surely worthy of that
Respect which is given to those men and women
Who earn it by grinding away
At that which determine the sycophant vermin
Is worthy of lifting a lash…’

Hours pass. The poem approaches two thousand words in length. After taking a truncated cigarette break (the break, not the cigarette, was truncated), M. continues where he left off.*

‘…Believe you not for a second the frost-bitten-phallus,
That Freudian façade [sic],
The false faces I display to fake friends
Whose frequent fornication
Fills my mind with fossilized fleas,
******-spiritual formication [sic]
For which there’s no vaccine…

…Once I’ve come down from the mountainous apogee atop which I sit,
Calmly surveying the ever-receding landscape through the lens of fleeting euphoria
Which, fading faster always, gives way to—no, I will not say it—I refuse to legitimate her lies.
As I descend with increasing speed,
specters of judgment torment me into insanity…
    
B  r  e
a   t  h
     e  ;

...this feeling I simply cannot bear—
their sirens threaten to burst my eardrums.
Although it’s undoubtedly pathetic,
I can no longer lie to myself;
I desire the approval
of those specters
who haunt
m-
e
...’

M. begins to hyperventilate, panicking at his embarrassment at publishing such a bad poem the day before. He grasps his heart, which is beating out of his chest. The fear of cardiac arrest simply increases his anxiety. Laying down on the ****-carpeted floor, M. attempts to meditate, imagining this to be how it might feel to do TM on *******. Minutes then an hour pass.
Suddenly, a much-welcomed epiphany presents itself to M.; as if it fluttered through his window and hovered, eerily still in the way that only hummingbirds can be, just in front of his face. So obvious does it seem (the epiphany) that he begins to laugh maniacally in the pitch of a female voice either pre-pubescent or near-dead; a kind of

YEE!    

YEE!      

YEE!    

HEEEE!

HE!

HEE!                      

HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

sound.
After minutes of uncontrollable mirth, M. holds his abdomen and makes the lugubrious [sic], delirious noises of tired suffering. After a few more YEE’s and HEEEE’s escape, he begins to regain control, trying not to focus on what he’d realized w/r/t futility as it relates to shame, but certainly ensuring that he won’t forget. M. sits in his chair with a old-man grunt, the sort of noise over which wives divorce their husbands.
He sips water.
M. opens a new document and begins to type:

For what do we write, we talentless wretches?
To publish some
gooey garbage
in hopes
that some fleet of demonic tween-age sociopaths
adopts our work as part of the canon of cuntiness?  

Not we, the veritable “un-poets”,
Our haphazardly-conceived writing stinks,
No, it reeks of fetid, smegmatic phalluses;
Of a ****** of maniacal madmen,
Blue-balled after an abysmal night/morning
Tossing crumpled ***** of money
At Patti’s plump-lipped, positively putrid-looking

&&&&               *****               &&&&

In an I-95 truck stop;
“Taste **** and *****
At Trucker Tom’s ***** Taphouse
                                        Where friends meet
                                            and literally throw money
                                              into syphilitic snatches.”

We write for the duty of identity,
We who might be found with a serious face on,
Writing rhyming, rhythmic,
quasi-**** lines of lead-heavy, snobbish lifeforce-larcen.
The sort of **** that keeps you from getting up in the morning.

But of course we are writers, as sure as the sea
Is blue, the day is long, who daresay that I am wrong?
And he who
doth [sic] dare,
I point to that long
******* I posted
ere the day began.
There lies his evidence though it belongs in the can.

Twenty percent who die in cold water do so within the first two minutes -
it's called cold shock response,
which is a really boring name
and kind of how i feel because
when your body hits the water
     it panics
and can't stop trying to breathe
and the water cools your blood
and hits your heart
so if you happen not to hyperventilate,
cardiac arrest is always an option.

I talked to a girl who claimed that earl grey is better than any other tea -
i wonder if she's had anything else
because if she did she'd know
that sharp cinnamon apple spice
warms best on a cool fall day
and hibiscus and rose hips
make you feel like a little kid again
and throat coat is something to be worshiped
or so i've heard, anyway
it's something i need now, anyway
because like this so called fact
this sore throat has been passed on
from one room to another
has sneaked down stairwells
and curled under blankets
and that's kind of how i feel
like autumn and rose hips and sore throats
and i'm not really sure what that means
but like obscenity when it is here
it's impossible not to know so.

i have killed my flower three times since i've been here, and i think i'm giving up -
i knocked it off the window ledge
and then watered it too much
and then watered it too little
not really learning from my mistakes
as much as letting them evolve
each stage a new form of destruction
and i kind of feel that way because
each time i pick up a book
or open a new tab
my fingers linger on my phone
and i'm replying to a friend
checking my email
playing spades
and when i play i bet too high
though i've been low for weeks
i've been as dry as my flower's soil
and it hasn't bummed me out
as much as other things have
and that's feeling less and less incongruous.

the boy sitting in front of me has a really high voice and a really small body -
his beard is well groomed
and it fascinates me
and while i'm trying not to make
any assumptions about him or anyone
which is turning out to be
a lot harder than i thought
he gives me hope because
he represents something i want
something i'll get one day
because nobody looks at him weird
when he speaks so soft and high
and nobody laughs at how short and small he is
and nobody asks any questions
because there aren't any to ask
that's just what he is, how he looks
and even if it wasn't always
how are we supposed to know
and why should we even care
but even so i find these people and
i want to be close to them, to speak to them
because they look like how i think i'll look
even if they didn't get there the same way i will,
but we spoke in an elevator once
and i thanked him for his help.

Today I wanted to buy the copyright to the process of hallelujah
******* in joy the same way whales eat krill
You just bottle it up inside your lungs until you have enough

Inside my fridge I have vacuum sealed jars of hallelujah
There’s nothing religious about that
Jars labeled things like
Loss of virginity
Rob lived this time
The homework is complete

Hallelujah

It’s the same way prayer works
Backwards
Pulling bits of god like an inhale

I want to hyperventilate on your hallelujah
Like a gospel choir on speed

It collects
Over time
For instance
It was maybe a month in to sleeping at Delia’s and Toffer’s house
Before I realized
I didn’t have to sleep in my car anymore
You go into the bathroom to **** and realize
Hallelujah
A jar labeled
Found a Home for now

I know science can do this
For the sake of all that is a monument to a single life
So that on your death bed, or at your funeral
Everyone there can hold a jar

Cold and warm at the same time
Vibrating in their palms
In violent joy
Like mozzletoff cocktails
They are thrown
And when they shatter there is a song
That has been collecting for years

The same word in different tonal joys

Your life

Every good moment

Hallelujah

I swallowed my lunch down the wrong way
and now there’s something in my lungs,
eggs, I think, cracked into little pieces
with the shells all picked out.
I really should have known when I couldn’t breathe
that I was doing this backwards,
but I swallowed anyway, and now when I hyperventilate
it’s like my body is trying to make an omelette.

It sounds so funny. It sounds like everybody
but me is laughing. I mean, it’s a ridiculous idea,
having eggs in your lungs,
but the more I think it’s true, the more I feel them.

I suppose this is divine punishment
for the impossible crime of eating lunch,
for taking those eggs and cracking them straight
into my mouth. There are probably some unborn
chicks thinking, in as much as chicks can think
like we do, that this is divine punishment.
Who gets the last laugh? The abortion does.

And now I’m on the table — medical, not,
you know, the dinner one,
and the doctors are saying that they’re going to cut
something out of me to keep me alive.
If it weren’t for the fact that my mouth
has been sewed up to prevent my own idiocy,
I’d tell them that that’s what I’ve been trying to do all along.

Anywhere, Anytime;
Anxiety Attack, Panic Attack;
Sometimes I cry;
Sometimes my chest tightens;
Sometimes I feel choked;
Sometimes I hyperventilate;
Sometimes I feel like I'm dying;
It's hard...
But I'm trying to fight....

I can barely move
I can barely talk
I can't breathe when I'm this way
It's gotten worse
And it happens more often
I'm paralyzed in a nightmarish dream and I come out gasping
I smile in the beginnings
because it tries to pull me under and can't
But after a while it wins and pulls me under
I fight
I try to move, but all I get is a bit of shaking
And I try to talk or scream, but all I get is a short puffed out breath
I try to breathe more, but I hyperventilate
I half wake up from it to try to get free, but it pulls me under and smiles at me

To me it feels like a worm
Wiggling its way
Through my bloodstream,
Making it icy and cold
And my heart turn
To frigid emotion.

It makes its way into my
Mind,
Slowing the thoughts
In some parts,
But giving the other parts,
The nervous parts,
The parts that hyperventilate
And have panic attacks,
Caffiene.

Breathing gets hard
Because
I'm underwater,
Or underground.
Buried alive,
Or sinking slowly.

I.
Can't.
Breathe.

The worm,
The worst part about the worm?
It feeds on my life.

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

Let me explain.
This poem is about sleeping, dreaming,
the failure of my inadequacies in poetry to heal.

Three years after its birth, it is exactly what I am feeling this day.
It is long rambling and you won't stay for the whole movie.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Erudition is perdition,
dreaming in words, accursed,
death to the visionaries,
release from visitations
of over-staying, unwelcome guests,
Johnny Cash, Jesus,
Forefather Jacob, Bobby Dylan
and their whiny,
smug-smiled missives
on behalf of the
all knowing, dream invader powers,
who
just-happens-to-be-know-it-alls.

These guys,
sub rosa angels,
electioneering,
hand shaking  
you into dreams
that make you wonder              
unceasingly  

I have renounced chants n'
dreams that
wander                              
meaninglessly

so if there is no
repeal of the stupification
of the human condition,
just invent words that  fool
willful and mostly please
nobody

don't ask and don't tell,
then we can agree
that a life,
its peculiar
Hallmark Card of grief,
cannot be
disambiguated

yours is yours,
different from mine,
single poems cannot solve
multivariate equations,  
un-blow mind sensations
that circumnavigate my mind    
as I edge along the
borderline tween the
United States of self-realization,
and a State of Mexico
drug-induced, seductive and
self-administered pat down,
a colorless, tasteless, dreamless
evening in the company of
a rest-once-and-for-all,
sleeping pill

Repudiate yourself,  
privately you
hyperventilate,
but others willing to borrow
those surfeit of rapid
misunderstood breathes,
stored in brown paper bags,
that will be divided
most ingeniously by the
Misappropriation Committee
for wordy oxygen tanks,
desperate for refilling

Recant, Renege,
Renounce, Repeal,
Repudiate, Retract,
I herby foreswear
all previous poems, please
Return them

Back, send them,
so, I can end them,
desist any new arrival of vaniloquence,
direct 'em to  the trash box of inconsequence

My wrongful w-rightings
are now cashiered,
my cool is in mourning,
my plateau is flat but
upsided downded,
words drownded,
both sides now, spring silent

Tried to swim to safety,
to Spanish Harlem
but no hablo espanol,

In Miami, they done me in
for the crime of
insufficiently thin,

In Ghiradelli Square
they deemed me too blond
not 'ciscan enough
yet, in Frisco fairness,  
done deported me,
making me to choose
tween Los Angeles and/or
Orange County

So, poet poseur, where you gonna run too?

My better half sleeps,
my left half weeps,
so conditions normal.

Satan laughs,
offers me ***** or poetry,
knowing full well that having
foresworn, addictive wordmongering, liscentiousness
that a single letter
would stupor me into a
drunken poetry slam at
St. Paul's Church,
into Satan's collection box
of wordy sinners,
where lost souls, ex-poets,
prevaricate
vainly, in hopes
that anyone will let them
transubstantiate
in order to avoid their
expiration date
on Stub Hub

surrendered the master key,
turned in my ID badge,
opened inner sanctum no more,
poetry boy is ratiocinated,
peril dispatched, swear that I've
excommunicated the voices
determined to disintermediate

the compromise I've reached,
help is contraindicated,
ex-officio is my new grace state

please, devices decontaminate,
otherwise, poems disintegrate,
excoriate them, don't wait,
to disassociate'em, insufficient,
remove them from hard drives,
yank'em one and all!

let the diet begin,
no more food for thought,
no more dreams
wrought and recorded,
permit the ambient calm
of the still of the night
that engulfs,
to harmonize with the flatline
dreamless sleep that the
mind monitor machine
etchingly, quietly records

let hours of research
be rewarded,
by my imbibing the product of
laboratory pharmacological
fine tuning

***** S.,
what outrageous ego
let me suppose that in
mine own words,
I could improve upon
your lovelies,
with now bland homilies,
recitations of my anomalies

What id sexed my brain,
was I completely insane,
to imagine that I could
improve upon:

"and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the
thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to,
'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd.
To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream:
ay, there's the rub"

Finished: Nov 27, 2010 4:44 AM

I sit in the steaming hot water naked and vulnerable, both mentally and physically  to blemishes accumulated on me.
The mental thoughts race back and forth between  my eyes playing and rewinding  back through mistakes I have made.
Remembering the wrong paths that dramatically  changed my history.
As the water rises I feel the anxiety inside my chest making me hyperventilate profusely.
I close my eyes plunging my face into the water, feeling my hair floating over me.
Staying under as I feel the anguish of the misconceptions of my life fall off of me.
coming up as if awakening from the dead, while ceaselessly  stepping out of the ***** water leaving it behind.
I peer into the mirror inhaling the air surrounding.
Slowly wrapping my arms tightly around my body, letting the women in the mirror know I except her.
Telling her I will always love and fight for her.

Our immediate discomfort always feels so wrong
Aren’t we all meant to get along?
It starts as simply as the set of their jaw
Before long it’s their toneless guffaw
Then their mere presence becomes an intense irritant
And you fight to suppress your instinct to be militant
Forget the initial dislike that began to percolate
Now you fight for control as you hyperventilate
Digging deep for composure you seek compromise
But then you recognise the mutuality of warrior steel in their eyes
You know they know
What to do; step away or let it be so?

i guess it came out wrong.
i guess i didn't mean to say,
"I only live for my grades."
i mean, i live for the stars,
planets, consellations, and
the black holes.

i live for the universe surrounding me.
but, i guess i was also telling the truth.
the only things i care about are my grades.
i hyperventilate when i don't have the perfect grades.
i literally cry when things don't go my way.
i need the highest gpa possible.

it's my only chance to a future,
its my only hope.
its everything i dream about,
think about,
and live for.

so, i guess i was telling the truth when i
said i had nothing else to live for
except for my grades.

i guess i should've let you
take me to the couselor.
i think i need one.

Every generation
has the leaders and the followers.
The popular kids and the geeks,
the kids who get high on the streets
and the kids who get high on cloud nine.
The artists and the poets,
the skaters, the stoners,
the musicians and the actors,
and we all have the kids
who are all of the above.
We all have the kids
who are none of the above.
Times change, yes
and trends come and go
but don’t tell me that I’m exceptional
not because of what I know
but because of the children
that surround me.
Don’t tell me to speak my dreams
and release my strife in the form of rhyme
because “few others you know do it”.
Passion is limitless,
passion is ageless
and while I’m being raised
in a generation of technology
and dramatic social media,
yolo and swag, pregnant teens
and 55-hour marriages-
I’m growing up
in a generation of artists,
a generation of dreamers,
a generation of doers,
and a generation
of freethinkers.
Freethinkers whose words
drip from their tongues like honey
and stain their pages in the world
like wine.
Students who get bored
with teachers wanting them to think
in 1’s and 0’s,
fit into standards,
speak in slanders
and begin to hyperventilate
because they can’t translate
what they think.
Kids who haven’t forgotten
that breathing in binary isn’t healthy.
Apparently, those that find
enough creative destruction in life to cheat the system
are going against the greater public’s
better judgement,
feeling free to sit and glare
at those who swear that they’re normal,
but I’m not growing up with those kids.
People who sit back and cry crocodile tears
for those who don’t know
what to think of themselves,
sitting back and laughing
at those who shudder and shake
at the thought of being caught in between
different sides of their minds
that they don’t know it’s okay to have…
but I’m not growing up with those people.
I’m growing up in a
group of rebels,
a group that will one day
run the nation-
a nation of tenacious activists,
wearing their minds
more professionally than
politicians wear their suits-
and with better ideas.
Because we have voices,
we have pens,
but most important
we have ideas,
ideas that can change the world,
change the world more
than poker-faced suits
and hate commercials
and picket signs
ever could.

All those I-hop visits in the middle of the night, all those nights sneaking out of my room and hanging with you until 4 in the morning, or saying I was sleeping over my friends house when I was really sleeping at your house, OR OR OR you sneaking into my room at night and crashing on my floor till morning.

I never regretted any of it. I still don't. I didn't think it was wrong. I still don't. You were like my big brother you still are. Yeah I knew my father and stepmother wouldn't approve of you as a friend (nor would the approve the misfit gang our friends) so I kept you hidden, hence all the sneaking around.

You called me panda growing up and would "******" anyone else who even dared to try to call me that. And Hell I was one of the few people who was allowed to know what your real name was (don't worry I wont put it up here).

We've been through hell and back. As Mistress and sub, Enemies, romantic interest, then siblings. We've been on one hell of a roller costar. But through all the yelling and the fighting that we seemed to always do, We always would find a way back to each other and bee there for each other through thick and thin. We always had each others back and would look out for one another.

You would sometimes take me on your dangerous jobs. I was always in that beat up old ford focus you had with an oversized hoodie on and your iPod blasting in my ears. You taught me how to fight with a Tanto (the dagger version of a katana sword) well two tantos, so now I am quicker throwing a knife then most people are pulling the trigger on a gun Something I am VERY Proud of, (See you don't need Hideous disgusting GUNS to defend yourself) AAAAANNND I am very deadly with just my hands and body (AGAIN you don't need stupid pointless nasty guns to defend yourself). And I taught you how to keep your temper in check (which rarely ever happened so maybe I didn't)

We let the other see sides of ourselves that we never showed anyone. You were for the longest time the ONLY person who knew what my ex boyfriend Jim did to me, and so there for were the only person who understood why the song DONT STOP BELIEVIN' By Journey would make me curl up in the fetal position and have such horrible flashbacks I would hyperventilate and cry my eyes out and shake uncontrollably  (Still get flash backs but no more hyperventilating or crying, now I just freeze in the middle of whatever I'm doing and shake really badly). I was the only person you would open up about what happened to your family, about the car crash, that is until a few months ago when you finally wrote a poem about it and started coming to terms about it.

I was the one who stood up to you and got you to see that your drug addiction was destroying you. that youw ere better then the "low life" **** you were portraying yourself as. I was the one who made you see the light (your words not mine)

You were the one to show me that I wasn't worthless, or a **** up, or a waste of space that my family was better off without (though I still struggle with that everyday).


I met you when I was only 12 turning 13, you were 15 turning 16. Now I am 21, you 24.

THATS 9 YEARS!!!

you left my life from the time I was 15 to 19. FOUR YEARS! you left my life because of your drug addiction, Those four years felt like A part of me was missing. My big brother was gone. The person who had been there for me through everything. The one who would always make sure I was ok and had a smile on my face. the person who when I was mad would sneak me I hop pancakes into my room when my stepmother or father wasn't looking. The person who was always there in the shadows making sure I was safe, Always protecting me.

But then you came back and I welcomed you eagerly. You promised me you would never leave my life again. that you realized that it was stupid. that you missed your sister to much. I was fine with that. I missed you too.

You finally got clean and free of your addiction. though you still did dangerous jobs... Which led you to getting shot and almost dying. But when you got better you quit those jobs and focused on other things. Like your Boyfriend and the love of your life who later became your wife.Then you started a family, You wife and your beautiful daughters. Gosh I love my nieces. You started to see the light. And I was happy to be a part of it.

But then Magnum (your kinda father figure) got hurt really badly and BAM you changed. You started to revert back  into your old self, dangerous jobs, cold hearted, distant. And nothing anyone would say would get through to you. You wouldn't listen to any of us. Not Mags, Not your wife, not your boyfriend. not even me.

THEN CAME THAT DAY

It was  September 15th 2014.


You posted a poem on here and I commented. and we did our usual Banter back and forth of you saying something and me being stuborn and not letting it go. you FLIPPED out and told me "I DONT WANT TO BE YOUR BIG BROTHER ANYMORE SO ******* AND LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE!" Goddess that hurt so badly

It felt like you had shot me, stabbed me, ran me over with an 18 wheeler. You ripped my heart in two. You told me to get out of your life. But you Promised you would never leave mine! You've been there since I was 12 years old and now you just want to leave? AFTER EVERTHING WE'VE BEEN THROUGH! you want to just wash your hands of me and be done? You want me gone? You want me to leave? DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THAT HURTS ME??? The ONE person THE ONE ******* PERSON who has always been there for me is now GONE!!! **** VANSIHSED DISAPEARED!!!

My big brother. the person I could always count on. :'( Gone... just Gone.. it left a gapping whole in my heart.

I tried to be angry. And I still am. THIS ISNT FAIR TO ME!!!!!! I DIDNT DO ANYTHING TO DESERVE THIS **** IT!!!!

WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME HAWK???? WHY??? WHAT DID I DO WRONG???? HOW COULD YOU HURT ME LIKE THIS??????

I've slammed the door on you. I cant handle this pain anymore. I cant do it without falling apart. I've slammed the door and locked it. And I don't know if I can ever unlock it. You've hurt me. Worse then you've ever done before. I don't know if I can ever let you back in. Yes I love you. That will never change. Yes even though you don't want to be you will ALWAYS still be my big brother through and through. That will never change.

But sometimes even though we love someone. we just have to let them go. Some times we have to protect ourselves from the pain they cause. even when we don't want to. Even when we want to cling to them and beg them to stop hurting us.

Maybe someday in the future I will be able to unlock that door and we can start again.. but I don't know. I honestly don't know.

I want to open that door so badly though. I want you back into my life. its only been a week and I already miss you like crazy . I miss my brother.

But how can I know you wont hurt me again? Is it worth letting you back in? You broke your promise to me about never leaving my life again. You broke your promise. How can I trust you again?

Getting pizza,
Carbs to soothe the anger and indignity.
Getting a takeaway box,
cuz you don't scoff it in time,
to get to class.

Walking towards class,
then turning around.
Thinking you look crazy.
You can’t go today.

You were crying in the pizza shop alone.
You were building up to hyperventilation,
as you crossed the road

You get to your car.
You can’t drive right now.
So you cry and you hyperventilate,
you hyperventilate and you cry.
You think about how people
saw you doing that on the way over
It’s embarrassing.

You ring EPS and you hang up.
You ring the crisis line but hang up.
You’re embarrassed that you’re
making a phone call but you can’t talk.

A man called Peter answers.
He mishears your name 3 times,
cuz you’re gasping.
You’re embarrassed.
You spell out your name
as you always have to.
You’ve got a weird name.

Your chest is getting tight.
Your head is getting light.
He tells you, you need to breathe.
Hyperventilating can make you pass out.
You know.

You barely comprehend what this guy Peter is saying.
But you’re following his instructions;
you’re breathing.
It’s such an achievement.
But, ****! This should be simple.
He asks you if you feel better.
You tell him you’re still worried about
What you’re worried about.

You lie down and cover your face with hair
when people you know walk past.
You hope they don’t recognise your car.

You’re driving to EPS,
You’re embarrassed.
You’re exhausted.

You take yourself and your pizza box inside.
You talk about what you’ve talked about before.
They have similar responses.
Tissues.
Breathing.

No-one knows you’re here.
You go home.
You’ve stopped crying.
You start crying again in the car.
You’re exhausted.

You cook dinner for your flatmates
They ask you how your day was.
You cringe thinking about the emails you sent
to classmates asking for their notes,
for the lectures you missed.

Much like being trapped in an elevator,
Awaiting your rescue,
Wondering if you should be the one to save yourself,
But you start panicking once the doors wont open,
You feel yourself shrinking,
Drowning in your thoughts,
Internally collapsing from the stress,
You begin to hyperventilate,
But not audibly, no, it's completely silent,
The utter silence itself is deafening,
You question the stability and structure
Of the suspended room that your life is being held in,
Back to the silence, was that a creaking sound
Or are you just starting to become paranoid now,
Is someone on the outside trying to pry the doors open
To help rescue you, and get you out,
Or is someone simply mindlessly hitting the elevator button
Waiting for it to come, though it never will,
Surely they'll become annoyed and just take the stairs,
But how are you supposed to get out of this situation,
This state of complete panic, you start to sob,
And that's when you realize that this is what anxiety feels like.

Shut your bloodshot eyes
Release your tight fists
Take a deep breathe
And come to your senses

No not sight
Not hearing either
Neither taste nor touch
But something more

A gut feeling
Instincts
Emotions
Instinct

Listen to your heart
And your unconscious mind
Thoughts can betray you
Or can they aid you

There it is again the question
The quandary that’s reoccurring within me
Do I go on emotion or thought?
Feeling or thinking

If I close the door the room shall implode
But I want the door shut
Maybe threes a way
Can’t talk it out

The volume turns up
The blood boils and my nerves percolate
Howling obscenities then hyperventilate
Striding in a cloud of lust searching for an outlet to release my demons

The walls shake
The sound bouncing off of them
Tears fall to the floor
Bonds are broken

The table does 360 in the air
Who had done that I have no idea
I am grabbed
No way

Fighting and grappling slamming against the walls
Pulling screaming
Punching

Pushed into the door
Push through the TV
Runs to the phone
To alert the police

Cast out
Forced to leave
Out in the streets
Presenting to the neighborhood our dysfunctionality

A heated punch to the car
A bone broken
A bridge burned
I walk away

I sit on the curb
To catch my breath
To calm down
3 cops pull up

Hot and ready to bust some heads
Firing questions
Ulterior motives are obvious
I can see their 2nd face

They come as friends and open ears
The tale is told
And their friendly aura disintegrates
And they treat me as a criminal

Putting me down
Talking down
Looking down
I spit at them

No respect
Talk to me as if I was a human
An equal
Not some animal

Come back to earth
You say the same thing
You think I’m on mars
But you’re all the way on Neptune
And I’m right here on a curb in a suburb
Of the county of Bergen

Or were both lost
Deep in the Milky Way
Neither is right
Let’s agree to disagree

My hands busted
My family’s torn
My girls crying
I fall

This is where going on emotion got me
There was no thought
And if there was it was evil
And spiteful

I begin to think
Using logic
Reasoning with all that occurred
I’m caught between the two

Can’t have one without the other
In all decisions
Over thinking
Over emotional

Balance
Balance is key

Intuition not mind boggling

Steak not goulash

Friend not lover

Know not question

Breathe not hyperventilate

(Add more please)

I scream,
Wishing you would scream back.
I talk,
Wishing you would talk back.
I hear my phone ring,
Wishing you were the person calling.
I answer my door,
Wishing you were the person who appears.
I eat,
Wishing you were eating with me.
I drink,
Wishing you were drinking with me.
I dance,
Wishing you were dancing with me.
I breathe,
Wishing you were breathing with me.
I listen,
Wishing I could hear your voice.
I walk,
Wishing you were walking behind me.
I laugh,
Wishing you were laughing with me.
I cry,
Wishing you would dry my tears.
I hyperventilate,
Wishing you would calm me down.
I bleed,
Wishing you would save me from myself.
I sleep;
& I know your here.
I dont ever want to open my eyes;
Because the only way I'll see you,
Is in my dreams.

It starts with a pin pick of blood
Stomach tightens and
You don't feel so good

The body begins to ache
Lungs start to hyperventilate
Though you try to manually regulate

The heart pounds and races
You clench your hands
Finding cuts in different places

Overwhelming pain sets in
Setting fire to the nerves
To repent for your sins

The limbs are lame and heavy
Broken pulls and levels
Effort makes you hot and sweaty

While life slips away
The mind will mistake
The remaining minutes for days.

I am not here to fix anything.
It is not my job.
It is not why I am here.

I am here to tell you
That it is okay to not be your best.
There will be mornings
when you will open your eyes and know
right away
Just how bad the day will be.

And that's okay.
You are okay
when you collapse under the stares of people on the street
when you hyperventilate on the subway
and when you consider
an eight hour shift, a 10-page essay, or a judgmental friend
the worst thing that could possibly happen.

Mama never said there'd be days like this:
When every little worry grows
under supernatural lamp light;
because they were her secret.
These little multiplying monsters,
they're everyone's secret.

But I'd like to share mine with you.

Sometimes
I want to be pathetic, laughable, and supremely odd.
Because I've had days
which felt like death
for no reason at all.

I've been yelled at, with marvelous power,
by the man who works at the bodega
down the street
and worried about it for days.

I've launched a string of terrifying mathematical torrents
every night
I couldn't find the 8 hours I was looking for.

I've tortured myself over B minuses,
screamed at slow traffic
cried during Disney movies
sulked over cold pasta
fretted about a stain on my shoe
and hated myself for eating two extra potato chips.

I have buried myself
under a mountain of stress-pebbles,
convinced each one was a boulder.

So it's okay
when you're all alone
and an adult is the last thing you feel like.

When you are sweating, hungry, and sobbing
in front of a half-finished paper
at 4 in the morning,
say to yourself:

"It is okay to feel lost."

There will always be a part of you
hoping for someone to wrap a blanket around you, hand you some tea
and tell you tomorrow will be better.
But they probably won't.
And tomorrow might not be better.
And that's okay.

You will be lost
and worried, and depressed, and exhausted,
but you won't stay that way.
And you won't be alone.

When your small sailboat is tipping and drowning
amid rough seas and sharp winds,
someone will throw you a line,
tie their ship to yours,
and you will float a little easier.

But until they do, remember this:
you are but one of many troubled sailors
searching for simpler skies.
You will reach them.
It has been done, is being done, and will continue to be done every day.

Eventually, when you have left the fog and foam
and thunderclouds behind,
you will be amazed at how far you've come.

So it's okay to feel lost,
to feel little,
to cry and scream and sleep too much
over little things now and again.

But don't give up when you do.
You are always floating forward,
sailing onward,
and this storm is only so large.

Even when you don't want to,
stay afloat.
These waters may be rough,
but you were born to ride their waves.

Heart clenched
Breath gone
Hyperventilate
You forgot your phone
It's the end of the world
My body refuses to cooperate
20 minutes
That's all this can last
Yet 20 minutes can feel like a year
As long as you give it the space
Wanting to stay and fight
Or fly away
But you can barely stand in one place
Your touch feels like iron
Trapping me inside this cage
Just let me out
Don't ******* touch me there

Im struggling to talk
Its making me silent
Im struggling to breathe
Its making me hyperventilate
Im struggling to swallow
Its making me choke
Im struggling to see
Its making me blind
Im struggling to listen
Its making me deaf
Im struggling to run
Its making me walk
Im struggling to jump
Its making me stop
Im struggling to move
Its making me freeze
Im struggling to remember
Its erasing my memories
Im struggling to think
Its making me un smart
Im struggling to be happy
Its making me depressed
Im struggling to laugh
Its making me cry
Im struggling to be calm
Its making me angry
I wanna move
I wanna talk
I wanna see
I wanna breathe
I cannot move
I cannot talk
I cannot see
I cannot breathe
Im pushing,
But its pulling
Im pulling,
But its pushing
Im fighting,
And its fighting back
Im struggling,
And its winning
I wanna be free
I wanna go forward
My freedom is punished
And to go forward is forbidden

I feel damaged, I feel broken
see depression had me trapped
At a young age
well before I had even spoken
When I was 8, I saw someone get sick
I spiraled infront of everyone
they saw me as a burden so
I was sent home real quick
When I was 10, I laid in bed
for two months...
I watched the same movie
and refused to eat because the demons in my head
When I was 12, I was scared to leave ..
my house and even my bedroom
I would hyperventilate
then cry so hard I'd heave
When I was 18
I screamed till my voice was no more
my cries echoed off the walls
but no one cared to notice
what happened behind my bedroom door
When I was 19, I was too nice
I put others first
but little did I know
a piece of my heart was the price
I am broken, I am damaged
everyday I wake up
surviving the day is always a challenge

Sitting there,
Attempting not to hyperventilate
She finds it hard to pace her breathing.

She’s drowning in the rinse cycle of her life

Trying hard to wash the fabric of her existence,
Cleanse the stains left behind from previous use,
She's doing as she needs to.

But she finds the whole thing disorienting
The walls close in
She struggles against the very process.

Yet she is fighting..
With every fiber of her being
To not give into habit
Natural brain chemistry…

Because she knows
If she falls apart now: it will all be for nothing
All the progress, effort wasted
And she wouldn’t have deserved it anyways.

I wish I were the one
you wait for online.
The one who makes you
bite your thumb,
hyperventilate,
enter a state of bliss and fear
as soon as you see my name.
Instead, it's the other way around.

I feel butterflies in my stomach,
in my chest,
in my lungs,
threatening to make their way
out of my mouth,
to spill out and run out in the open.

My fingers are too frozen
to type out two letters,
let alone an entire sentence.
They are too preoccupied
covering my mouth
to stop me from screaming
when you send me a message.

"hey. :)"

And before I could stop it,
the first butterfly
flutters out of me.

Shallow breaths,
fists knuckled,
beads of sweat forming on my forehead.
The tension was very palpable,
and so was the nervousness.

I remind myself, take deep breaths,
but as the time draws near,
all I can do is watch,
and to hyperventilate.

Shallow breaths,
fists knuckled,
beads of sweat forming on my forhead,
The tension was very palpable.
And I was nervous.

I didn't know if it was because,
of my impending performance,
or if it was because,
of the events that would happen when this is all

over.

I didn't understand beauty until I fell in love,
and then that's all I could ever see.
I saw it in chaos, and in destruction;
In scars and open wounds.
In heavily loaded one-word text messages
hey
and texts like love letters taking minutes that feel like hours to send.

I can feel love like a lemon being squeezed on a fresh cut,
and in the excruciating numbness of the dark silence.
I can feel it in those moments where I run out of breath,
and the ones where I breathe too much and hyperventilate and things
start
     to
          fade to
                 Black.

I didn't understand beauty until I fell in love,
and suddenly my pain was pleasure
and my anger was a soothing balm--
and everything was heartbreak
even singing our song.

I wonder how long it’ll be
before my rhyme and metre
fit together again,
like the beating of my heartbeat.
How long will it be
before the machine that is me
will begin to animate
and breathe,
breathe normally again,
breathe out a sequence
of 1’s and 0’s
because maybe
then I won’t be able to translate
your name,
and I won’t start to hyperventilate.
How long will it be
before all the wrongdoing
catches up to me?
Will you smell the cigarette smoke
on my clothes
or will you catch a whiff
of me regretting
ever letting myself
get addicted
to the hope of dying?
In 5th grade,
when my demons
first poured my own blood
like stagnant spring water
down my skin and
my heartbeat slowed,
I realised that
though my sword had rusted over
and I could no longer fight those demons…
I could still fight myself.
I could still fight for my right
to not be okay,
but as my demons got stronger…
I gave in.
We’re on the same side now,
we focus on a common goal-
destroying
me.

I still can't talk about you in therapy
I hyperventilate, and it scares me.
I don't understand how us affects me
I always saw you as a safe place for me

I tried to be safe for you too,
But have realized how bad I am at
Comforting others, especially you.
I tried my hardest, but never felt correct

I'd cry and get frustrated
over the urge to protect.
I'm extremely empathetic,
I'll throw myself under the bus, it's pathetic

I feel everything you say,
I take on your emotions
and this seems to cause pain
But I don't know what to say

It just happens,
You share with me
And I feel everything
I try to convey my empathy

To help you feel okay,
All I wanted was to be there
Like you were always, for me
I think the best thing I can do is set you free.