Poetry: Chronic

by Erin Yoo

"Tear-soaked" 
 by Erin Yoo

Chronic

by Erin Yoo

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i. depression

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Why does everyone lie to me

            Easy prey – is that all of me they see 

Why do I lie to myself

That my disorder won’t manifest itself

Briny rain deluges from the corners of my eyes

            Rubbing salt in my abused, pockmarked visage

                        It’s like someone with bruised feet were forced to walk on nails

                                    Yet still not to par with my chronic travails

Depression is one of those things

            That engulfs your consciousness with plinking tings

Blithe novices try to emulate but can never try to be

Cliches and scripted rhymes abound – it’s an easy win for a life that was never won

[ – the pity glee]

I feel like I’m in a milky stew

This feeling of serrating anew

            Of being wholesomely chewed

My mouth forms the corners of a smile

My eyes pools with faltering life – it’s all a beguile

I had always aspired to be a doctor

            But it wasn’t to escape this realm of ostracizing tractors

Mental health disorders – aren’t a medicinal gauze blanket to receive “I’m sorry’s”

            I shielded mine with an impregnable buttress – to relish in this “normality” and tarry

For depression to be equated as sad,

            Likens it to a blood-kin of a transient fad

Someday, 

            I want to be the beacon of reality-dredged hopes – ground it with stolid clay

Heartbreak syndrome.

            Sounds like one of those movie titles, as captivating as clever palindromes, [doesn’t it?]

ii. letters

Dear Reality: I’ve been living through a silver screen

            Caring not to be brutally vivisecting, to be seen

Dear Anguish: you’re not an acting figment

            You know no particular cerulean pigment

Dear Hope: I thought we were friends

            Until I lost it all – our camaraderie killed by violent ends

Dear Dreams: for you, reality bursts at the seams

            Pastries – cheerily aesthetic – are hurled at pastel-dressed walls for being sour cream

Dear Life: you’re packed with undue strife

            So, why do you refuse to be severed by an acute butterknife

Dear Death: you make me wonder if misery is all it seems

            Life is only long enough to take a spry breath – of jar-bound mayflies it teems

Dear World: Time is making me paranoid,

            Thanks for making me look normal – humanoid

Dear Heart: from your left ventricle, life abounds

            But from heartbreak syndrome, paralyzed heart attacks resound

iii. resolutions

Dear Self: I think I understand you now

            You seek a life of perfection – one word of advice: your own life you shouldn’t tow 

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[NOTES]

This poem was awarded "Honorable Mention" at the 2023 Scholastic & Art Competition (Georgia region)