Kept in front of me is a rough handmade paper
Its furrows are similar to my unsettled life
The thick graphite pencil I hold up to sketch
My anecdotes that has made an impact on me
As soon I start sketching, the graphite smudges
Leaving dark and ugly patches on the paper
And an indelible mark between my fingers
Depicting the dark shadow that has followed me
Everything I hope for, is daubed by overcast setting
When I take up the erasers to wipe off the mishaps
The friction creates a colossal mess on the dreams
I realize that I have distorted the sketch I started
But the deep lines of graphite stare at me sullenly
Such indelible sketches hover in my mind
Not even the best of erasers can wipe them off
I tried in vain, only to be left with abrasions
I have given up on drawing up any dreams
No longer, the handmade paper allures me to sketch
For I have used up all the graphite, drawing, failures
So many failures already etched in my memory
Left with nothing but the memories of defeat
Like the dark smudges of graphite, hovering my mind

Dear Talia,

I don't want to be a tortured artist.
I don't want to be depressed and I don't want to be anxious.
Competitive sadness and disorders treated like accessories disgust me.

The world glamorizes mental illness, and I don't understand why. There is nothing romantic about being mentally ill just like how there's nothing glamorous about a broken wrist or a torn medial collateral ligament. There's nothing romantic about constantly being afraid that the world will fold in itself and **** you with it. There's nothing romantic about feeling like you could break down and cry at any moment.

This is the first piece I've written while being medicated.

I want it to be Christmas already.

The world dreams itself a halo, but can only attain horns. The halo is an illusion and the horns are an idea.

I'm due to take another Lorazepam. Would I look cool to the kids who idolize dysfunction and misinterpret pain as style, if I were to take one of these, with water and a distant glance, in front of them? Geez, to have their approval would to have everything and nothing at all.

I'm not sure why I've written as much about this as I have.

You.

It is 2:48 am and all I can think about, in this moment, is you.

I can't wait to spend Christmas with you. I can't wait to wear bad Christmas sweaters, and be the couple everyone hates, as we sing Christmas carols and spread holiday cheer.

I wrote this poem a few minutes ago. Sometime around 2:30 am. I'm not sure. I'm exhausted:

I sat on the edge of my bed, and on the edge of my life,
medicated to the point of pointlessness. Soft.
It was the nineteenth, not the twentieth,
and I wished I saw the fireworks with her fifteen days earlier.

My gasps tore the shingles off of the house.
And they hung suspended above the hole in the roof.
And God stared down into my room, as the shingles swirled skyward.
"I see you," I said, "but I don't believe in you."

I left home and ran until I was a dream that had passed itself.


I hope that was okay.

I love you.


Yours,

Joshua Haines