RUN! Thatās all I could think, all I could do. How long have I been going? So afraid to look behind me, Iāve forgotten what Iām running from. Darkness engulfs everything, itās as if Iām hurtling through a black hole. I canāt seem to recall the monsters on my tail only the terror they radiate. My mind is screaming something I canāt make out over the sound of my bare feet hitting the darkness beneath. Suddenly Iām stuck my feet melting into the darkness, rough breathing in my ears. The creatures claw and screech āyouāll never be free, remember meā
The days were longer, and longer. Lonely, so lonely. I felt manic, the day I think that it happened. I had just cleaned the entire apartment top to bottom. Every nook explored, every cranny web free. After my exhaustive effort it must have been three days on no sleep. I do that a lot I suppose I stay awake for days at a time. I think itās to torture myself, or maybe itās to evade the little death that is sleep. That night I was happy, looking forward to a change, maybe the biggest one of my life. After I had cleaned I needed a bath, I needed to wash the past off of me. I remember it well because I poured searing hot water straight on the top of my head and it made me feel okay.
Itās been weeks, maybe months since that night. I had been taking my medicine, but it feels as though I had been dreaming. I canāt remember the last time I left the confines of my apartment. I just sleep and sleep and sleep and then sometimes I wake, like today. Today is really yesterday as Iāve not slept since then. I realized however a few odd things. My pills spilled on the bed, but to many bottles maybe twenty. A crockpot in the kitchen with rotten food. A sink of dishes done but not put away. A knife in the bathroom. These things I donāt remember how they got this way. My fiancĆ© seems to act like they arenāt there, but he canāt miss these things, can he?
I canāt feel him like I used to and it makes my heart hurt. I feel like a ghost in his life, like Iām floating alongside him, and sometimes we touch or we talk. The talking isnāt how it used to be, he isnāt really there but I suppose neither am I. I feel it when we touch, when we kiss, but not in the silences, not in the noise. I lay in the bed more and more while he plays games with friends. Itās like a little bit of me is disappearing everyday, and I donāt notice unless I stay awake, but he doesnāt let me stay awake to long anymore. He gently reminds me to take my medicine, lay my head down, and to breath. breath. breath.
My dog is getting older but it seems so slow, she is skinnier everyday. My cat, my girl I see less of her and she lays in the bathroom on a pair of my dirty pants, she lays there a lot. She used to lay on my hip all day and night, but now I hardly see her. My boy though, rather his boy is always around in the shadows, a clever and cute little black cat getting bigger so fast. They all seem to have flees and the itching drives me mad. I donāt mean crazy I mean mad, sometimes at night when the house is asleep I drag the knife on my skin to stop the itching. I never seem to bleed. Only scratch. My legs look torn.
No matter how I try, I canāt bring myself to clean the crockpot, to put those dishes away, pick up those pants on the bathroom floor. No matter how much I bathe I am never clean. My fiancĆ© says there are no fleas, and if I keep itching it will only get worse.
These little things keep adding up and Iām scared. New neighbors come and go so so so so often. A family. A young couple. A group of partying college kids. The fighting family. The lonely old man. The single mom of three. Right now itās empty, letters and late notices peeking through cracks, hanging from the knob.
I see these people but I canāt remember the faces, I canāt remember the accents, the colors, the weather. I canāt handle this feeling of fading.
I donāt want to disappear, please wake up
It wasnāt yours to take, but nevertheless you ripped it from my grasp.
You smile. You Wink. You didnāt think.
You pushed. You shoved.
You tore. You thrust. Overcome by lust.
I was small. I was young. There was tongue.
Itās okay. Itās alright. Your so tight.
Please donāt. I canāt and I wonāt.
You ignore. Treat me like a whore.
You beat and I try to retreat.
I wake up alone, on a porcelain throne.
No one believes me, they think Iām easy.
The bruises are red, inside I am dead.
It wasnāt yours to take, but nevertheless you ripped it from my grasp.
The way he touched me, made me shiver.
His eyes were bright blue like a river.
His hands were large with a dirt covered hue.
I love you he said, over and over like these were the only words he knew.
I loved him hard heās the one I was sure.
Our love it felt pure, I was sick and he was my cure.
Let me hold you he said, as he drank away his liver.
He was a taker and I was a giver.
His eyes got darker as time passed by, more like the sky when a storm is nearby.
His hands turned from soil to turmoil.
I hate you he hissed as hands became fist.
I loved him, I thought. I couldnāt resist, desperate for one little kiss.
He held me and missed. He held me so hard I thought Iād cease to exist.
The way he touched me, made me shiver.
I try to find beauty in everything. People tell me my concrete jungle will never be beautiful. They just donāt see what I do. The rain pours down, making the steel giants shimmer. The people are below my window bustle about umbrellas sprouted everywhere making a symphony of sights, a meadow of wildflowers in a place the wild has been long gone. The trees in their neat little planters, have been nourished by the rain, making them come alive as if they were plucked from the garden of Eden. The sky is a plethora of hues, a gradient that lets you know the storm is here but be assured that showers always bring flowers.
I am dead but Iām still breathing.
Smells of lilac transport me to a different time, one when I was still alive.
The silky feel of my skin in the shower reminds me of my innocence.
Sadly all things must end.
The cold packs a punch and my mind reverberates trying to recall the time my innocence was no longer mine.
This fight it happens often.
I am clean but I am dirty.
My mind is mine but it is not.
Some say deep breaths.
Some say break a sweat.
None of these things will cure me.
Iāve tried and all it does is lead me to the bathroom.
The bathroom where I can travel to a time when things were different.
The bathroom where I can cry into myself, and the water wipes away my tears.
The bathroom where I try to bring myself back to life, like the lilac in the spring.
I am dead, but Iām still breathing.
I have a dark secret, one I have pushed down deep inside my soul.
I want to feel pretty but I have to stay in control.
I put on my makeup, and I fasten the wig, my girlfriends red lace, ready for the disgrace.
I pose for the selfies and I feel ashamed.
but Iām pretty, Iām beautiful, Iām in my own lane.
If she ever finds out Iām sure she will leave if my family finds out they will heave.
I cover it up, I keep it a secret, Iām a man and thatās how I should keep it.
Love is something I ponder often, is it real? Love can mean many things to many people, but Iām talking heart pounding, unlimited happiness type of love. I burn bridges so I suppose Iāll never know if the kind of love I imagine is real or not. Iāll always continue my search, I thought Iāve loved several times but it turns out it was just life teaching me a lesson. So Iāll sit on my shitty sofa eating left over pasta, and watching tv mindlessly until one day I figure this whole thing out.
I tell myself ten pills is to many I take nine instead I lay for eight minutes I feel the head rush in seven I cry for six minutes I laugh for five I canāt breath, I just need four minutes I canāt think itās only been three minutes I cant see itās been two minutes Iām not here, one more moment this couldāve been solved.
I lay in bed a lot, itās sorta my thing you know. Late nights staring at my phone, hoping for a slumber that isnāt coming. Bipolar has this stigma around it, this idea that we constantly change our personalities and feelings. That we are essentially crazy. I know if people could just understand the singularity of our minds, they wouldnāt judge so hard. I am living with this illness everyday. Everyday I think I will be ok. Bipolar never fails to break that notion. I am consistently sad, except the rare occasions when my mania hits. Those few hours or sometimes day are like the most effective drug in the universe. Pure euphoria. Thatās the problem though, when you come down from that drug, that high, itās like death. So I am constantly agonizingly suffering a death, while my brain chases the high.
