Let hope wrap you up in its gentle arms, let it never let you go.
Let's be honest.
Let's be truthful.
When you meet your own eyes in the mirror
Can you recognise or a least reconsider
The apathy
That you let cling to thee
It's carefully downing you
It feels a secure embrace
But you're afloat
You've lost the boat, to passion, to joy, to meaning
It's calling out
ahoy
Where did you go
I see your eyes meet mine in the mirror
I see what once was starting to flicker
Are you but a ghost
A lost dream turning thinner.
I'm going to be honest, I'm not happy. Instead I just am. Just here. Just there. I'm, just. I spent way too long picking the colours for this blog instead of cleaning my house, I spent way too long worrying over my poems instead of worrying over the bills, I spent way too long writing about things that have happened and not about what could. I reply with flowers under comments because I'm worried I'll sound too blunt without them, but sometimes it feels fake, because I'm not that person alone, I don't think in pretty colours, happiness doesn't bloom behind my eyelids in pinks and yellows. Instead my thoughts are blunt and apathy stuffs itself into my ears and covers my eyes. It encases me in a womb, and I'm just waiting to be reborn. Into what exactly I don't know, just more awake I hope, less rotting in bed and more laughing in a field somewhere.
Have I become addicted
to the sadness,
has it evolved into a hybrid
of apathy
of melancholy.
Will it stitch itself to my eyelids.
Will it clog up my narrow veins.
Is this the type of pain,
that drives my buried hope insane.
I sat outside on a wall across the pub. My dad was inside. I hadn't spoken to him in ten years. But I had seen him through pub windows and passed by him as he smoked in doorways more than a few times. Once I heard him sharply inhale, coughing as cigarette smoke choked him when I passed, but reached out he did not and neither did I.
It was summer, the air was warm and still, the daffodils had fully bloomed. I don't know how long I sat there, but I know it started to get dark and the streets emptied. Someone in the pub put on Sweet Caroline, everyone inside sang it with all the energy of a football chant, I hummed along to the chorus looking at the sky as it changed from blue to pink to black. I sang I'll be fine (I know now those aren't the lyrics) even though I felt so alone in that moment, I was adrift, I was waiting. And I'd waited long enough. But how could I stop. It was all I had.
I kept my eyes fixed on the door for awhile, then the stars, then back to door blinking against the tears gathering at the edges of my vision. I wanted to take off my shoes and rest my feet on the cool pavement, I wanted to feel rooted in something other than my loneliness, my sadness, but I didn't. Instead I quietly sang along to Sweet Caroline, sang about hands reaching out and felt more alone than ever, felt an ache settle deep and heavy into my bones, i suppose I was rooted by my feelings after all.
I'm not sure why I stayed there, was it in the hope that he'd spot me, rush out, hold me close and say it's going to be okay now , dads here or was it a punishment mixed with self pity. All I know is I couldn't bring myself to go inside but also didn't want to hide. The song ended and the stars above looked on in indifference.
Then a man walked passed. I got ready for a suggestive remark or something similar. there are some streets in my city as there are in most around the world, where women line dark alleyways and men in cars roll down their windows and ask how much, and if you happen to be a women walking alone in those areas you might get asked if your working tonight. So I was prepared for something along those lines, I was prepared to politely smile and get my keys ready between my knuckles if needed. He paused for a moment.
"Are you alright love?" he asked, his voice quiet and concerned.
With the relief came the overwhelming need to tell him the truth, to spill everything to this stranger, to tell him that no I wasn't alright, I was deeply not okay and the heavy feeling has been following me around for so long I dont know how to live without it, instead I indulge in it, I give it a place at the dinner table, I drink it with every meal and tuck it close to my heart every night, I use it as a substitute for a lullaby. But I couldn't , I didn't.
I flashed him a quick smile , the most hollow thing you could imagine, the only thing I could muster. it was just something I did to get him to walk away. "Yeah, I'm good thanks".
He didn't walk away, he stood there with eyes so caring I was afraid they'd make everything I was holding in unravel in a messy pile at our feet. "Are you sure, really?" he knew I wasn't, my sad shining eyes didn't help.
I shook my head slightly, another quick smile "I'm sure."
Do the people we drift away from ever return to us.
When my parents spilt up I didn't see my dad for months, during this time I would spend nearly every day playing with my friend Kelsey. We would get our hair caught climbing trees or make terrible perfume from her neighbours flowers. One time she pulled out a box from under her bed, it was filled with snails of different sizes collected from her garden "we're going to colour the shells". So that's what we did, we gently coloured around 20 in bright orange, red or purple, after that we put them near a tree by her house. We did all this to see if the same ones would come back, we thought at least 5 would. Weeks went by and we didn't see any colourful shells in her garden, they had moved on. Sometimes people leave and they don't come back, but you still hold the memories close, you still carry their mark on you and maybe they carry yours too.
Maybe somewhere out there, there are snails with brightly coloured shells and maybe carrying a piece of someone with you is enough.
When pain has crossed the limit
It turns into a heavy stone
It sinks into soft skin
Continuing past flesh and bone
Until it finds it's way
To your feather light soul
And there it stays
heavy and cold
A Reminder to take care of yourself, drink some water, get some sleep and do something that makes you happy.