I feel as if I will never write again.
I feel the doubt and fear,
paralyzing me until I don’t know what to say or hear.
They hate me, don’t they?
I fear their eyes,
their words,
their tears.

But I cannot speak.

I listen for the footsteps.
Where are they now?
Lighter footsteps slamming the door until I cannot hear them anymore.
Heavy footsteps have gone as well, the door is opened.
There they are.
I feel small,
so small
and little.

The word regression comes to mind.
They are coming closer, switch the tab, and hope that they are blind.

Questions are like landmines, and each one is smaller, still, no matter the size of the landmine, whether you try to confront or evade, they all are set to ****.

I don’t know if I can do this, be anyone I want to be.
Will I be a starving artist and a disappointment to my family?

My name is Fear, I do not grow, I am small in every way.
My impact is big, my job so large, and yet small in stature is how I stay.

Am I Fear, or am I something hidden far below?
If I am Fear, then tell me please why does my power grow?

As soon as I speak I forget the words, the problems, and questions as well.
There are so many things I yearn to learn, so eager to tell.

Growing up is stupid, and you can’t disagree;
so many things have gotten harder with age for me.

Don’t go outside,
don’t say a word,
don’t stay on the path,
don’t be deterred.

Don’t sing,
don’t write,
don’t flirt,
don’t fight.

These are simple things to ask of you.

Don’t listen,
don’t hear,
don’t have courage,
don’t fear.

These are what you know, and simple things to do.
Impossible standards are easy, the simple tasks are hard.
Is it one voice now, or many?
Are you always on your guard?

Listen, See, Do, Be.
These are simple, don’t you see?
Doubt is here, or is it fear?
Or maybe someone new?
All of these thoughts are yours my dear, so what does that mean for you?

Want to know why I did not die?
Because I did write.
Want to know why I survived?
Easy - because I write!

I was 13 - I was lost
and I wanted to **** myself
I wrote a letter to, but instead
I had a story to be told
my own...though I did not know...
a brain to arrange - my feels,
my thoughts
Art up, broken child!
Bleed onto the page and go drain the pain!
Do something! Make sense!

The night was threatening and I could not sleep
Everything so sharply and hurtfully real
I touched life and oh, ****** blisters
all over me
Opposites coming close
I am the mixture of them all

And my soul was shabby and in ruins
I could not tell what was me and what wasn't true,
so many times
Nothing was clear but the soreness
I felt, yet that was the proof I was there, too.
Art up, broken child! Do not lick the wound,
stitch it with a few rhymes!

And there were faint rays
of what could be
The kiss I never got these days
The dreams I had that got delayed

Later, the flow got stopped - because I got clogged
All pain, all emptiness, all doubt
Frozen inside, fetters outside - caught up
I decided to retreat because I could not be
yet I thought I was striving to be freed
Had no certainties at all, so my mouth I shut
so my power I shunned - I was blocked

So I can never shut up
without shutting down
And my words came back at me
as soon as I entered again the scene
I am here because my pen never sleeps
Therapy can be expensive but notebooks
are cheap

Yet now sometimes I feel so full
My pen is bloated in it too.
And we lie happy, satisfied,
just seeing things go by,
just wanting to be by your side...

something big
goes on when I don't write

I hid
So I could go out
I wore the mask
Of self doubt
From being broken
Too many times
I hid my face
To pretend I was
      Fine.


                    -L.Frost

A swerve and crumple

the too-low Miata meeting
the steel of a
semi's rear.

top speed impatience
becomes

a mangled massacre
of twisted plastic and metal.

Bone just powder in
a pillow of pink
red-streaked
pulverized flesh.

my jaw agape as I pass too slow-

existential dread is the hand
contorted upward
a few fingers missing
or lost in the mass-

A horn brings me back.
People too late
to care.

I contemplate stopping
but I'm late too-
and there's nothing to salvage
for me here.

There’s construction on the way to therapy
I detour my own way
Ignoring the glaring orange signs
I know better I think

Swerving in and out of neighborhoods
Not paying close enough attention
I’m keenly aware of bikers, animals and children in yards
I fear being the driver

I don’t know where I’m going but I end up at the office anyway
Twisting and turning until I just
Arrive

I tell her
I’m sorry but my thoughts won’t be linear
My brain is no longer working
Or at least not working like it was
Before things were logical,
linear
Straight
Frustratingly narrow
Packed up into wooden boxes
Splintering my hands when I try to move around

Now things are split open
Wrecked into a circle of pulp,
strips
sharp edges
disconnected

My thoughts roll out in many directions
Following things that are folded
Slinking
Out forward and backwards
And ultimately ending up back
Inwards

I know there’s no signs I can follow
I’m under construction
It will be a long time until
I see a freshly paved road
With a street and no bumps

my therapist told me that I should
try to imagine my mental illness
in the form of a person.

she said that sometimes
it's easier to fight these things
when they aren't invisible.

she said that maybe
doing this would help me to
remember that I am not crazy,
and that a mental illness is
just as real as a physical one.

she's told me over and over
about the chemicals in my brain,
and how my ****** literally
changed the way that I function.

she told me that he put
my body into a chronic state
of fight-or-flight mode.

she made sure
to use the word "chronic"
and not "permanent."

she makes sure
to remind me that
recovery is possible.

but when I try to picture
my mental illness
in the form of a person,
it has his face.

all of my demons
have his face.

when the therapist asked
about my family history,
I gave her a history lesson.

I told her that growing up,
my house was a war zone.

I don't remember
what year it was, but eventually
the house collapsed into itself.
that trauma left me scared and hurt
with nowhere to go.

my mother moved out first.
she moved straight into
a life of addiction, and then
she found a new house
in the form of a jail cell.

my father also began
to call a jail cell his home.
he moved into the newspaper,
and then into the database of the
national *** offender registry.

now, we have separate houses
and conflicting beliefs.

we don't share anything
besides that story
and our DNA.

I couldn't tell her
about my family history,
because I don't
have parents anymore.

I have no family.
all I have is history.

if you tell me that you want to know
what it’s like to live the way that I do,
I will laugh to myself, because
the truth is you don’t want to know.

you don’t want to live the way
that I live, or feel how I feel.

and even if you did, you can’t.
you can hear about it
and learn about it,
but you can never feel
the way that I do.

don’t keep trying to understand
the way that my mind operates.
don’t keep trying to feel like me.

be thankful that you can’t.

but if you must know,
imagine this:

it’s early in the morning
and you’re at the end of a dream,
or maybe a nightmare.

you’re kind of awake,
but not quite. you’re groggy.
you haven’t gotten out of bed yet,
and you don’t feel like it.

and then you hear your
alarm clock going off,
and you realize, oh ****,
you’re late to work.

you need to get up now
and you know that.
but when you try to,
you suddenly can’t.

you’re stuck in your bed,
unable to even open your eyes.
you’re not paralyzed.
you seem physically fine,
but you’re stuck there.
you have an overwhelming
need to wake yourself up.
you don’t know why you can’t.

you’re stuck in your bed for so long,
you begin to think that maybe
the dream that you’re in is now real.
maybe the real world isn’t there anymore. you can’t think of a logical explanation.
it doesn’t make any sense.

yesterday, you woke up
and got out of bed, and you
made it to work on time.
you were even a few minutes early.
there was no problem at all.

but wait, how long ago
was yesterday?
you don’t know
if yesterday was yesterday,
or if yesterday was a year ago.

you’ve been stuck here,
frozen in your bed while
the earth keeps spinning.
you have no way of knowing
what’s going on
in the world around you.

you know that this feels wrong.
you should’ve been able
to start your day.
you shouldn’t be stuck.

you know that you can’t
be living in a dream.
that’s not possible.

you know you’re not asleep.
you’re wide awake, but you’re stuck.
you can’t scream. you can’t move at all.
you’ve lost control over your body.
you can’t wake yourself up.

imagine that no matter what you do,
you can’t wake yourself up.