it’s the helplessness that gets to me
not that i feel
un-helped
but how unhelpful i feel to those
i know
are suffering.
mental illness
June 17, 2023
the sin of being me
is punishable
through inside and outside means
and my brain can only get so far
in forgiveness
when it’s constantly fighting against itself
and my body seems to cling to living
as it falls apart
and resolves towards innumerable lifetimes
and my soul only ever seems to
chill inside/beside
all this angst going on around and around and around
but the dark part of me
[brain?]
[heart?]
[body?]
[other?]
it keeps reminding me
that i am punishable
i should be punished
through some means
hold my beer
i’ll do it
myself
[‘if you want something done right,’
right?]
May 22, 2023
a big sad
an overwhelming wave
of the depression i know best—-
we should be friends by now;
i see them nearly every day,
but their company is always unwelcome
and puts a stop to any idea i had for my day
the worst part
of my particular depression/sadness/melancholia
is that it makes me feel
like all this writing
(which really does make me feel a little bit better)
isn’t
actually
worth
any
effort
at
all
chugging along
the energy it takes
to simply press a key
with a fingertip
expands
exponentially
and i start feeling
exhausted
the fits and starts and stops and hiccups
the pulsating of a pulse part of me wishes didn’t exist
the tears coming to eyes that somehow still can’t cry
the thousand-yard stare into the nothingness of existence
the loneliness felt even when i know so many feel this
and my best friend is sitting mere feet away from me
the vignette of darkness shading the corners of my vision
of my image for my life now
and this poem is taking too long
and has too many words saying nothing at all
all i want to write
is
depression is hard.
March 27, 2023
i have so much pent up poetry inside me
and not enough concentration
or mental stabilization
or even the words
to get it all
out
in any sort of way that i could even slightly say
might change a few happenings
around here
i need
some
hope
February 20, 2023
i’m pretty great
at
poetry of the mundane
(if i can give myself that credit)
but i’ve been edging towards
a more gruesome poetry
as of late
poetry of the gross daily tasks
the icky parts of being human
the scattered co-morbids of mental illness
the ones with strange satisfactions
and i don’t want to subject readers to such poems
as odes to pimple popping
and detailed descriptions of how my anxiety makes me
pick my skin to bleeding
but
they are part of my human experience
so maybe
they are also a part
of yours
?
January 23, 2023
they always say
‘follow the dopamine’
‘follow the dopamine’
but what if the desired dopamine
only arrives for a minute at a time–
you get a huge rush
of desire
of want
of an activity you know will
feed your whole soul
but life (or whatever)
gets quickly in the way—
you have to feed the animals
or use the restroom
or simply finish the one task you’re on now
but that tiny fraction of time
that it took to walk to the supplies
to fulfill that rush
of dopamine you followed
was enough to make it all
disappear
maybe i should start listening to
the ‘faults’ of adhd-ers
and use them as a blueprint
or some kind of a script
because this here is–
this cycle of almost-but-not-quite spikes
of dopamine
followed by long valleys of grand depression–
this is unsustainable
and, frankly,
ain’t
it.
January 22, 2023
i wish i understood
my own moods:
where the deep depth of despair
comes from/
what makes it open its great maw
and swallow me whole
just to spit me out
a day or two [or a few] later
is it hormonal?
is it simply having a new experience on the agenda?
how am i happier when i’m about to do a novel activity
but also my anxiety
flies in the face of everything?
why can’t my brain/body/heart connection
calm down enough
to understand
to comprehend
to compassion and savor and
everything in-between?
i can feel myself begin to understand
that not understanding may be an important part
of connecting with my truest self.
but i’m an analytical little kip,
and understanding is how i start
to accept and love parts of myself,
so this seemingly completely randomized set of emotions
and emotional turmoil
just makes me want to comprehend it more/
hold it tighter/
because letting it go
and be
seems
the surest way for it to take over…
(but in what way doesn’t it take over
every
single
time?)
i’m hesitant
i’m breathing
i’m waiting
to understand
or to understand that i don’t need to understand
and i’m trying to prepare myself
for not understanding
but it’s so
damn
scary
-on a precipice-
January 20, 2023
i feel like
every atom of my body
has been dipped in molasses
and is just trying to do the best it can
in the given circumstances
but that best
is not the best
i’m used to
so i keep pushing
when maybe what i need to do
is rest?
(i sleep all the time.
i don’t do much.
but when was the last time
i rested
without guilt?)
(was it ever???)
January 17, 2023
if we are to attack with metaphor
with analogy
with any sort of literary
device at our side
what would my depression be?
a shadow?
sounds too cliché
too perfect
but hear me out:
it’s always there
just sometimes i can’t see it
from my particular angle
and different environments
make it a different type
of shadow:
large and looming/
grounded and serene and looking just like me/
a tiny pool of darkness at my feet/
or not at all there
(but change one light
one type
of something
anything
in the room/place
and there it is again
and the question of
‘did it really leave
or was it just laying
in wait?’
and i’m unsure if we’re speaking
within the explanation or reality
within the metaphor or truly
just talking about my relationship
with my ever-constant frenemy
depression)
so if that darkness
is a shadow
what is my constant worry
of anxiety
what new analogy
could i find
for thee?
December 13, 2022
i feel unfit for human consumption
like my entire being radiates harmful isotopes
like the population would probably be better off
hiding inside
rather than being exposed
to me
but why
do i identify
as a pariah?
i’ve never really been an overt outcast
even as an awkward teen, i had my people.
the worst things that have ever been said to me
have been directly from me
but maybe that’s what makes
a profoundly isolated child/teen/adult
one where even one’s own solitude
is marred by toxicity
and one can never
truly escape
the bully
i know of others
who have survived egregious bullying
by escaping into their own minds
and imaginations
what happens when the mind
is the worst minefield of all?
kipventures 