Performed at Lincoln High School’s slam poetry competition, won second place, April 2022

causation
concentration
creation
depression

the circle of my mental health
the circle is a merry-go-round 

CAUSATION

I think
and I

think

and

I

think

of the fact

that I have a paper due Thursday at eleven fifty-nine in English but an Italian third level class at the community college so I won't be able to do the English paper but if I don’t do the English paper my grade will go down and if that happens my parents say to get my grade back up and if I don’t they’ll take away my phone and I'll have more time to work on the paper but if I write the paper I won’t go to my college class but then I’ll be behind and then they’ll talk about an important topic without me it would suck to be behind

IT SUCKS TO BE BEHIND

The thoughts fill my brain by the nerve, each flowing pathway freezing over with paranoia 

CONCENTRATION
so then I concentrate and I put my head to the ground
I work hard for a week
I write and I translate and I solve and I film 

and I burnout
my brain is drained of the capacity
to get through the day

so then I think
the most original thought to come to any student’s brain,
the smartest answer to the being-behind:

the all-nighter

Think of those wasted hours sleeping
when I could be grinding my brain into a meat shredder, extra fresh for tomorrow
where I’ll fall asleep in English
because the teacher is playing spoken-word poetry
And that’s the easiest thing to fall asleep to, isn’t it?

So I stay up
I finish my overdue assignments, maintaining that three-point eight five
I spend the next day stumbling through the halls,
the sounds echoing around my ears
The lack of sleep takes my ability to push away the fog around my head
I crash on my bed at eleven-thirty and pray that I won’t sleep through the seven o’clock alarm

CREATION
On the chance that I do have off time, I write
I pull out my computer with a cup of water
and write til midnight
These moments are the ones where I finally relax
It’s how I let it all out
I write down my pain and my hunger to forget it all
I know that’s not healthy
but for me, at this moment, it’s what I need

It’s now on the screen, immortalized in times new roman and twelve point font
I make poems called “preschool butterflies” “the trees above” and “boy”
They sound so sweet but they’re about
losing my childhood,
how physical touch is all they thought about

The CREATION allows me to throw it all down into a Google Doc

Maybe I’ll publish them one day
The hurt is clear through my metaphors and all-caps writing
My anthology will glare at him from across the Barnes & Noble

DEPRESSION
When there’s no CREATION left, it falls into DEPRESSION

The days drag on,
a gray smear across the canvas of blurred-together memories 
Sunday comes, then Friday, then Friday again
The cycle of school, sleep, school, sleep is never-ending
I throw the covers over my head and wait until dreams overtake me so I don’t have to think anymore
THOSE thoughts cloud my brain every second of every minute of every hour of every day

But at least I tried, right?

The circle is a merry-go-round, right back to CAUSATION
and she thinks
and she

thinks

and

she

thinks…

thank you.