It all started when I was really young,

I spent my days hiding from the sun,

Biting my tongue, in the shadowy grip that clung,

Squeezing my throat, starving my lungs,

Feeding me lies that dripped from their tongue,

That I’m all alone just a fight to survive,

To disappear in the sun, from the world outside,

Yet within my mind, truth was denied,

Chaos into delight, voiceless thoughts collide,

Where shadows whisper stay alive or die,

Echoes repeating, violently eating, a chance meeting, I wonder why,

My mind slips passed in the hello goodbye,

Heart beats to a drum, a synchronized hum, alive without a pulse,

I think I’m going crazy, on second thought that might be false,

Started out as a prayer yet ended up a curse,

I keep telling myself it could’ve been worse,

I could’ve been dead or riding around in a hearse,

Instead voices keep coming on these pages in words,

Anxiety keeps me second guessing but he helps me put together this verse,

Echoing in my brain, violating my mind it’s perverse,

I try to turn it around like Hey Terry, put it in reverse,

He don’t listen just keeps coming, raining down on me, drowning me out,

I open my lips as if to speak back I can’t I’m stuck in a storm cloud,

Sadness strikes like lightning my spirit left in doubt,

The thunder gets so loud you can’t hear me scream or shout,

It changes quickly, writhing within me, leaving me in a frenzy,

Reminding me I’m only one but they are here and they are many,

They weigh me down in this bed of thorns to bury,

Left with the company of these feelings that leave me feeling empty,

Try to swim to only sink drier in this sea of me,

Fists are clenched and palms are sweaty,

I don’t know if I can take this much longer,

I’m getting weaker by the day as they get stronger,

Blood is starting to boil feel like a lamb getting led to slaughter,

I’m confused as hell I’m writing this but I’m not the author,

Lost and locked outside my mind I trip and falter,

My mouth shoots like a machine gun but I’m not the talker,

Breathing the waters of horror I’m a goner,

Filling me up in this sea of me I’m sinking,

Constantly thinking while I’m slowly doubting,

The voices surround me creeping and screaming,

Feet are cold toes are freezing, insides start to shake leaving me,

Twitching and slipping stuck still in this seizing,

Breaking me, some pieces are sleeping, some are screaming,

I’m exhausted, wide awake, never sleeping, Moments are fleeting but last for eternity,

A whispering iota of hope they are a silent rioting, Delightfully delighting as I’m kicking and writhing,

Sinking faster, nothing matters, a blinding mystery,

I’m rock bottom in this sea of me, the rest is memories lost in history,

I’m a downpour in a drought, the silence in the chatter,

Questioning questions why can’t I find the answer,

Minds a battlefield, thoughts seem like locusts coming to devour,

The fertile fields tranquility and hope, every seed and every flower,

Invasive thoughts like malignant cells make them cower in their power,

Intensifying the dark corners of my psyche, feeding on my fear I can’t begin to scour,

Feeding on insomnia, PTSD, depression and anxiety, igniting with every encounter,

Growing beyond belief with everything I can’t remember,

Doubt and despair broken beyond repair, turned to stone by their Medusa Glare,

A choice of hope but what is that? Oh I know it’s called deceptive expectation,

A relentless siege trapped in a loop of rumination,

Hung up by a noose around my thoughts, trying to outrun this exploitation,

Leaving me paralyzed, hesitation begetting deviation,

Leaving me in a state of trepidation,

Longing for liberation, yet ensnared by the promises of respiration,

But like cancer the end is only the beginning of expiration,

Infected thoughts cloud my mind melting it to liquid from matter,

Collapsing in on myself drained by my captors devoid of any laughter,

Mixed with a heart attack waiting on the next chapter,

Forever promising the next childhood actor,

To evaporate into Hollywood’s Happily Never After,

Hope is an illusion hiding behind encrypted expectations,

That promise of relief that ends in laceration,

Persperating into thoughts of exasperation,

Drowning in the sea of me devoid of rehabilitation,

A manipulation of visitation, anticipation of imitation,

Emotions running amuck in a host of assimilation,

We try and try to believe in ourselves to overcome the blast of a shotgun,

Pieces of a piece that can’t tell anyone,

That they are in control and I try hard as hell to swallow,

Sinking in this sea of me, the death and life that’s the beginning and end full of sorrow,

Sinking down into the realm of bardo,

Sadness, depression, insomnia,

Keeping me down, sinking into an abyss of hysteria,

Of dementia and the need to explain,

Dancing in the rain tied to a chain,

That moves through the core of my soul,

Rotting in a hole, beside an unwritten scroll,

That could leave me whole but I vanished like a heart full of holes,

Invading me, beating me, berating me till I’m a soul without a home,

These emotions multiply until I sow what I have sewn,

Talking to others in the world of the strong

Out of dedication, we need to feel like we belong,

Together we are strong, knocking and beating at their door on the porches we’ve been thrown,

I’m a copy of a copy less than a clone,

Thrown from the known, pulled from the eye of a cyclone,

Anxiety and depression I’m prone to be alone,

The remnants of my bones, calcified into stone,

Cut to shreds by emotions overthrown,

Hate, fear, sadness, and despair,

Anger, loneliness, pushed away without a care,

All together to impair the disrepair,

A life laid bare, for all to look and stare,

Standing at the alter past the gates of hell,

Trapped in a spell, in the sea of me I dwell,

I climbed till I fell, lost in a maze that is a jail,

I cut off the devils tell, in this tale I want to share,

Emotions playing solitaire, putting me together tear after tear,

I think I can get away but to try I don’t dare,

Fair or unfair, unaware beyond repair,

To this I tell you I swear, a declaration to declare,

It’s only just started the rest a moment lost in the air,

Blowing from here to there, this isn’t the end but till then I bid you farewell!

—TerrySalmon—