explaining my depression

it goes like

it hurts.

 

you can’t hear me through the gasping breaths, and so you ask

“what?”

 

“it hurts.”

but i can’t hear me through my beating heart.

and i start to believe that it wouldn’t be so bad

if it didn’t beat anymore.

 

my mother tells me that happiness is a choice.

so why then would i choose to feel this way?

my vision blurs when i lay on the couch

and stare at the blinds for too long.

i don’t like this drunken state of unknown.

 

i might feel motivated in two hours.

i might move, i might shower, i might eat a bite of food.

or i might drop to my knees on the floor;

clutch my heart.

i don’t like this drunken state of unknown.

 

it hurts. it’s the clearest explanation.

“why don’t you meet up with friends?”

asks a friend whose physical distance from me

keeps us from meeting.

 

anxiety joins the table with the mere mention of social obligation,

and why would i want to show up at the table

with depression and anxiety disguised under “plans” with friends

who would be chained to the empty table with me,

for i undoubtedly would show up empty-handed.

i have nothing to offer to myself and even less to party.

 

it hurts,

and even in its numbing pain, it hurts

like a gentle reminder that i’m not allowed to be happy.

i cannot be happy,

and then i forget what happiness felt like to begin with.

 

but then i find it in the memory of your arms

making me feel safe, wanted, and the numbness

is blocked by the all-too-real breathtaking pain,

and i’m gasping again.

 

nights are the worst. and mornings.

and those moments in-between.

and i feel peace only when i can sleep, but i can’t sleep.

insomnia becomes my only friend,

save for the broken nights and i, so well-acquainted.

 

and it hurts.

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