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I Don’t Know What I’m Looking For

Is happiness so elusive?

I went to a counsellor a few years ago, after my family Doctor’s intern tried to send me to a hospital. I told the counsellor: “I don’t believe anyone is happy.”

From there, I was sent to a Psychologist. I waited for 30 minutes past my designated appointment time, in a room with people I deemed crazy and thought, am I one of them? After speaking to me for 2 minutes I was diagnosed: Bipolar Disorder. He added the medication to my antidepressants and sent me home.

Albion Falls, Hamilton Ontario

My mother had emailed our Doctor to tell him I’d had a manic episode. I’d gone from hours and days of sitting on the couch staring, unresponsive at the wall, to cleaning the house, making strange jokes, and being filled with unexplained energy. I hadn’t explained it for a reason.

In a house of contained emotions, stifled sexuality, and painted on perfection, I’d discovered release. I had to keep it quiet to keep it safe.

As a 20 year old woman who’d been ‘outed’ to her Family Doctor, as a psycho, I felt betrayed once more by my mother. Creating mountains out of mole hills was her way of ‘showing she cared’ but it made me want to drag those mountains on top of myself.

“For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move”

Matthew 17:20 ESV

Surrendered

Strong and pure, you face

The eye of the storm,

Cause this ever-frozen hope

To melt, and feel warmth.

Walking through blockades

As if they’re dust,

And I start to think

You may be more than moths and rust.

I am the leviathan;

The end of times.

But you treat me like a still small voice,

And disregard my angry rhymes.

I yell at you to go away,

Brandishing lies.

You take my hand and choose to stay,

For all of time.

I raise my frozen wasteland face,

The battle done.

Snow pelting down like glittering lace,

I look up to see the sun.

My weapons melt

To warmed rain,

It seems you’ve won.

I surrender all my fears to you,

You are The (my) One.

Alone

What to do

When you’re empty

And alone

Just skin and bones

Willing to be reduced

To less.

I confess,

I feel useless

The grave

Speaks to me still

In words only I understand:

“Take my hand,

Rest a while.”

And I smile

At promises of peace

That leave me

Uneasy.

The pain in stranger’s eyes

Calls to me

In languages

Only we can utter.

Opens passages

To worlds

Only we

Have ever known.

All Magic Comes with a Price…

What we had was magic

So good it makes me ache

Came with a price like magic does

And just like magic, fake.

We wrote our own love story

And unwittingly our demise

For what’s a story really?

Except more fucking lies…

You rode in like Prince Charming

Slave to lust and greed

Stabbed me in my heart

And for years just let me bleed.

Our story was a fairytale

But all stories end

Like a child I believed it

Though fairytales are pretend.

The book is finally closed now

But you’re still on my mind

Because tainted love leaves many scars

But worst it leaves you blind.

It’s Only Natural…

Arms surround me, heated and huge, like the sun.

You pull me in close so I’m surrounded by your body

Like warm air on a beach day. I bask in our energy.

Your shirt comes off and my fingertips are drawn to your skin;

Your body is an art form I can’t tear myself away from.

My hands travel down your chest like I adventure on rock trails and my eyes shine just as brightly as my fingers skip over the chiseled trails your muscles form.

I’m giddy with curiosity and the innocent sparkle in my eyes causes you to wonder.

We wander for a while in the chasms of each other’s eyes and minds.

I want those arms to hold me down while your chest presses against my naked body.

Press that rocky path of muscles and hot sunshine skin against me while I struggle.

I’ll make you beg and whimper with longing till you wrestle me in place.

Make me scream.

Love Affair with Death

I feel nothing. I only hear.

I hear the bored world telling me

I’m nothing special.

I hear death, charming and strong.

It tells me to come…

Beckons me with its fingers

The whisper, so close to my ear.

I shiver.

My heart beats faster as Death begs it to find peace.

“Come.”

My body longs for it,

My mind tingles.

Let me lie with you.

I come for death.

I rest at last.

Parched

Rivers plan their course,

Following my quiet footsteps.

But I am a broken force,

Dragging along the shattered remains of what’s left.

I thirst.

Rain throws itself from the skies

To slide down my skin,

My lips refuse to part.

Only my eyes join in—

I weep.

Waves rise up and crash hard to reach me,

But I climb the highest rooftop— Scarred.

I’ve drowned before.

Each inhalation of water teaches me,

I’m cursed.

Life sits peaceful as an unstirred lake,

Fills me to my brim with flavourless, tepid, nothing

Numbs me till I cannot wake.

I long for it to shake, earthquake… something!

I sleep.

…And I dream of cold well water swallowed and streaming into my feelingless soul.

I shiver

It’s Selfish to ask me to Live

I tried to kill myself. It didn’t work. I keep wondering… was I even close?

Why is it up to someone else to determine what is right for my life? Why is it up to others to tell me that it’s wrong for me to want to die? It’s a conflict of interest when family says it’s selfish for me to try to kill myself. If I’m in pain, isn’t it selfish of them to ask me to stay, to spare them from pain?

Mine is only one life. I want to go out as inconsequentially as a candle. People who don’t speak to me or spend time with me in my painful moments tell me I have to stay. It’s what they need, it’s what they want… but if they aren’t interested, they can’t be bothered to give their time to me, would they even notice if I was gone? This reminds me of my incessant need to shop and inability to throw away purchases I’ve never used.

I’ve heard it said that people who think about suicide aren’t necessarily going to kill themselves. When people decide to kill themselves they are often calm or at peace. This is what I felt. A sudden peace, knowing that this is what was right.

Afterward, I only regretted it not working. I may have been at peace or perhaps was so detached from the event that I had very little feelings toward it. Leaving this world was going to be harder than I thought.

I didn’t want to face my boyfriend. He kept asking to see me and I kept making excuses. When I tried to cancel on him for the millionth time in the course of three days, he called me out. I let him come. I left the door unlocked and lay in bed. When he entered my room I looked at him, emotionlessly.

I couldn’t bare to hold the weight of his pain. I rolled over uninterested and detached from his feelings. Why didn’t how I felt matter.

He climbed into bed and held me and cried.

It took me a few days but suddenly it hit me. If he had tried to kill himself, how would I feel?

Walk Carefully…

My mind walks this tightrope carefully.

And nothing scares me like the demons I bore,

They rattle my ribcage till I’m trembling.

Like a wounded animal, my Sanity Roars.

I aim at my soul my harshest thoughts,

like bullets,

Take down joy with heartless hand grenades,

It’s safer to put my trust in let downs,

If I am the villain, of whom am I afraid?