I thought we could share poetry that we wrote before, during, and after our battles with addiction and mental health. I wrote the following the day after my friend committed suicide. I was trying to look at his POV to understand how his mind was working. I’m currently working on my POV from when I found out.
SUICIDE
S ometimes you get an urge you want to die.
U nderground six feet I shall lie.
I am who I am and who I want to be.
C lose my eyes, cut my wrist just watch and see.
I see my world spinning around and around.
D evoted to my feelings of death while I drown.
E veryday is better can’t you see, because I am
not here, so do you miss me?
I just wanted to feel what he had to have been feeling and thinking. No, I’m not suicidal in any way. This is just me living through him and understanding how his mind was working to have to actually act upon his thoughts and feelings. I just wanted to share to help myself heal in a way as well. Thank you.
I wrote and shared this earlier this year, but the thread was deleted as the person who started it has now left the forum. It’s called a break from the storm.
covers tight around my head
storm clouds circling my bed
get up!
going through the motions
doesn’t save me from the ocean
drowning in the waves of thought
that amplify, disturb, distort
swept away by life’s distractions
overwhelm leads to inaction
suffocating in my mind
just want to leave this all behind
i step outside
and breathe
feet connecting with the ground
soaking up the sights and sounds
crunching over woodland pathways
sunlight dances through the branches
a break from my cacophony
birds in trees
the hum of bees
the leaves that rustle in the breeze
alive with natural symphony
the more i walk the more i see
the nature of reality -
beautiful, difficult, messy
a delicate balance of effort and ease
reflecting on a fallen tree
the life it’s had
the things it’s seen
the travellers that crossed its path
tired and weary
smiles and laughs
the wind and rain and sleet and snow
the sun and moon and stars aglow
every year its leaves would fall
and every year it grew some more
now lying on the forest floor
weathering its final storm
upended roots but not quite dead
new shoots rising from its bed
the moss and mushrooms taking hold
new life emerging from the old
the life it’s lived and the life it’s given
protected
connected
interwoven
as i sit against the bark
the daylight fading into dark
savouring the calm and peace
in knowing there’s much more than me
there’ll be more dark and stormy days
but they will pass
life finds a way
I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . .
Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
