Showing posts with label depression. Show all posts
Showing posts with label depression. Show all posts

Perseid Nights

The gift of a science celestial.
It’s the atmosphere’s firework festival.
The night is a warm one, breath-catchingly clear
with the galaxy’s profile an ethereal smear.
Cricked necks and curses at errant headlights
as space detritus burns up in the heights.
But,

beware, beware
adoringly gawping,
star-strickenly fawning
ignoring the floor
and where you’re walking
‘cause you’re outside, right?
And on these humid Summer nights
your every step is beset by

slugs.
These slithy gherkins
lurking; determinedly
mucously marking their paths
Those hobos hopefully hunting
sustenance
by the garden fence
are often tragically reduced
to a smear
less ethereal and more entrails.

When we noticed all our potential victims
of heavy footed murder, we picked, toe-tipping
across the pitch-dark path, therein
turning eyes to earth and star-sights missing.

It occurred to me the verse of learning is hidden in everyday things.

For if we live for the spectacular
we risk that sickening crack you hear
when crushing Sluggy’s cousin
to oblivious oblivion.
Similarly,
if we diligently
avoid this genocidal killing spree
we miss all the good stuff.
With eyes for the earth
and cricked necks and curses at the errant soles’ hurt.

There must be equilibrium.

At the hem of the horizon
the cleaving beam of the valiant beacon,
halfway between there and back again.
This suffocating compromise blinds us
to both wonder and loss.

When faced with this decision
I find I’d rather play
a game of sluggish hopscotch
and watch meteors when I may.

I’ll give you back your even keel,
your solid, dependable lighthouse deal
I’ll reel
with my nadirs and zeniths instead.
For as long as I’m feeling

I know I’m not dead.

Clown.

Just one more clown in his circus you are.
Such a public mockery.
You are a tool in his all-consuming self-love.
Unwilling to face the one way, blackhole nature of it all.
You stand in painted smile.
The audience watch clutching breath
for him to pull out the chair.
The ringmaster owns your eyes and time.
Are you so blinded by footlights
that you can truly call this
astounding self-degradation
love?

Just one more clown in his circus you are.
Watch the pretty girls lead the horses away.
The spectacle is leaving town.

Speaker Celebrity

Three years of ridding myself of my rage
left me bellaputrescent and old for my age.
I appear to you now as a mere wizened spectre;
A wrinkled and cynical regret collector.
My most squalid and heartbroken version of self.
Insurmountable walls built on negative wealth.
Don't judge me on all of my confident bluster.
The truth is so human, severely lacklustre.
The best metaphor is that I am a pearl;
A wist-wasteful woman in guise of a girl.
Layers of glamour, a heart made of sh**;
My place in this world an uncomfortable fit.
Now hollow of eye, of cheek and of heart
I fantasise daily of ways to depart
and romanticise leaving no remnant behind;
Of wiping all memories of me from all minds.
Don't get me wrong, it's not my own demise
that's driving me now - I'm no suicide.
I want retrospectively not to exist.
I would never have chosen a life such as this,
knowing now what I know. If I knew then
that my life would be guided by follies of men
so selfish and cold they can't even admit
when they've lied. Would I want it? Not in a fit!
They tell me that if I pretend long enough
-at happiness, love and all of that stuff-
that one day I'll wake up and I'll feel content
walking this finite and f***** firmament.
They tell me that life isn't really so bad,
that I am environmentally sad,
that all will improve, given hope, given time.
"It's just circumstantial. Try going outside."
So I straighten my face and strengthen my defense
And once more construct my perfected pretence -
That I'm choosing to live, I've the world on a plate.
That I'm not just a selfish and boring ingrate.
And who knows what will be in the days still to come?
Not me, if I freak, chicken out and just run.
Now I bid you good day, tip my hat, flash a smile
and invite you to wander this path for a while
and keep walking until we emerge in the sun.
For my life in the shadows is near enough done.

Surely?


Affirmation

Even in the midst of night
the distant wail of T-Rex's cousins
reach me.
And even when I am not right
and fall and fail I let the lessons
teach me.
And in the hours I feel alone
I remind myself of the myriad network
around me.
And all the things as yet unknown;
Concerns of health and joy that lurk
astound me.                            [impound me]                           (glass is half...)

I refuse to forget who I am.
I refuse to forget who I am.
I refuse to forget.

A Good Talking To


Heed the prophet as she comes;
bitten nails, mascara runs.
What once entranced now nauseates.
Love once inspired, now apathates.
No balls for you, young Cinder-Zappa.
Weak and cowardly. Empty wrapper.
Betrayer of your youthly self,
Now 9 to 5 and on the shelf.
Uncreative, antisocial.
So far removed it's downright woeful.
The slip so far to what you are
can only treasured memories marr.
Reclaim yourself, take back the night.
Keep your goals within your sight.
Self-sabotage and confidence lack
have stolen years you'll never get back.
Forget the times you could have made it,
before your chance and youth have faded.
Focus now on what will be
as working truly sets you free.