Member's original poetry

[MisterSaunders]

added link to published poetry section(April 26th, 2018)mmt

http://survivingantidepressants.org/topic/17045-meaning-through-poetry-favorites-published/

 

 

I thought I'd try and have a little fun while I deal with tapering off these hellish pills. Enjoy!

 

 

 

"Doctor" I whined, "Help me, I'm so lost!'

"Worry not patient, take this, it's called Zoloft!"

 

"But what does it do?" I asked, holding the pill,

The doctor laughed first, and then fell perfectly still.

"Young man" he said softly, "Whatever the issue,

Take one of these, and I bet it will fix you."

 

I looked at him sceptically, I still wasn't sure

This magic pill, I'd heard of before!

A wonderful cure-all, a magic elixir,

Citalopram was one, another effexor.

 

I wanted to know that this was legit,

Others before this one were impossible to quit!

So I breathed in deep, and sat up straight:

"Take one yourself, if this thing is so great!"

 

"I don't need one" he said, "I am healthy and well!"

"If I took one now, it would put me through hell!"

I looked at him closely, to see if he'd break,

The tension was growing, and I saw his lip shake...

 

"Alright!" He screamed, "This pill isn't fine!"

"They paid me to say it! GlaxosmithKline!"

I pressed him for details, I wanted the facts

"If I took this pill, how would I react?"

 

"Okay", he said. "I'll tell you the details,

but remember the price at which this retails!

It cost's nothing to make, but increases wealth

of those who make it, but it's bad for your health!"

 

"We don't know for certain how these pills work,

but the side effects alone will drive you beserk!

You may crave carbohydrates as if they were air,

and 6 months from now you won't fit in your chair.

 

You came to me feeling melancholic,

Come back in 6 months as an alcoholic.

Prepare for insomnia, and get ready for dizzy

You'll need time off work! I hope you're not busy!"

 

I felt let down, upset and betrayed.

He looked sad too, he was obviously dismayed.

 

In fact I saw tears, and I knew he wasn't faking them:

"And this is before you try to stop taking them"

Edited April 27, 2018 by manymoretodays
merged some original member written poetry

[Rhiannon]

LOL, love it!  Thanks for sharing that with us, and for writing it in the first place.

 

Someone who's better at moving things around than me will probably move this to Off Topic or one of the other areas, since this area is for "intro and update" member threads, just to let you know in case it disappears. 

[dalsaan]

Ha ha. This is great. Very clever

[Petunia]

love it

[mammaP]

Brilliant! 

[Designerguru]

I'm giving you a standing "o", Mister Saunders!! Wow!!

 

Anne

[MisterSaunders]

Thank you all!!! Xxx

[WinningThrough]

Fantastic poem!

[NoMeaning25]

Wow really articulated very well

[Laura]

They say truth is in poetry! Very good job!

[geoff22000]

great poem MisterSaunders!  GOOD TO LAUGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[westcoast]

"You came to me feeling melancholic,
Come back in 6 months as an alcoholic."

Wow...altogether a great poem!

[crimsonking]

 

 

After my depression started I discovered that writting poems relieves some pain.Here are some of them. Enjoy

 

Life is just another lie

 

So many places and nowhere to go

So many people and no one I know

I guess thats the way it is

Ticking of the clock

Another wasted precious hour

And nothingness

I think about loneliness and the meaning

Of happiness

And hope

I write stupid poetry

About love that I don't believe in

And looking for a friend that I never had

The world is covered in fog

And Im afraid

That we call it life

 

 

Friend

 

Pain in my chest

I guess its time to meet

I light up the cigarette

Forgot about sleep

I laugh and I scream

It doesn't matter

What makes us who we are

I won't forget and neither should you

We meet again my friend

How many times today I cannot count

You smile at me at the mirror

Youre in my tired eyes

We will always be together, you whisper

I silence you

Its time to sleep

 

Edited April 27, 2018 by manymoretodays
added link at top

[oceanwild]

good one . 

[Nino]

Pretence

 

I pretend everyday and say my life is ok???

But I regret a lot, too much to say

So I pretend and struggle everyday

Pretend to laugh, pretend to care,

Pretend I'm happy when people share

To say I am not happy means admitting alot

And to myself I'm not ready to stop!!

[manymoretodays]

Oooh.  Love.  I will try to add some someday......

[manymoretodays]

summer is almost

 

over now.....  and I am not

 

healed enough yet

 

 

but in this moment

 

i can be all i ever

 

dreamed to be.......now

 

 

2 part haiku.....5-7-5 syllables

[manymoretodays]

(any number syllable, any number of lines haiku or myku...even wound up with some corny rhyming stuff..... )

 

the waves have stopped crashing

 

i am out of my boat

 

the beach is a window on which I now float

 

i do want my boat back and there it will be

 

today i be walking in sunshine and free

 

the sand is all warm and feels good on my feet

 

the sun is has just risen

 

this beach must be east

 

no body is out yet......it's beautiful here

 

but oh wait......i see a mule deer

[Purplestars22]

All the poems here are very good and they are emotion provoking.

[manymoretodays]

Myku.

 

And a longish one at that.

 

live from the southwest part of the country

Out of the monastery

the shanty survives and morphs once more

 

into the recovery/healing clearance home

of the brave

the boy has arrived

(pause for tears)

 

i have a housmate son

who needs my help yesterday

my most cherished person ever

(pause for sob again)

 

my finest creation with God's help(okay I had to capitilize his/her name)

seems okay today........average

now

 

felt happy and joy for a few

most definitely felt that sense

that it is going to turn out

right or left or middle or weird

 

but it is going to turn out

(gratitude sobs)

 

thank you

 

definitely a fine, fine tea time today

[manymoretodays]

I think I temporarily lost my muse

 

I sure have a lot of chores

 

This job of mine

 

At least the food perks are getting better

 

And the company is nice

 

Feeling rather contentedly purple

[manymoretodays]

the idea came from

the last of my AM listening

write about love it said

 

so i will write about love?

who me

sunshine has gone to court

gman is 62

i posted

 

being loved

there that's better

i think

by one

and how

 

to return that grace

even while basking in it

 

oh i am such an interesting/not interesting

genetic mutation

in purple grey

 

i digress

how to be alone

and not say much

even to myself

and feel the sunshine

of the most magnificent sun

that i know

i should have brought tissues

sunglasses suffice

 

Love

a warm wind blows through it

[LostInSpace]

Anti-D Withdrawal, medicinal dread

Cannot be described by some ink on a page

Normalcy's gone, the senses have fled

Put out by the synapses, freshly outraged

 

No one can know of their fate that awaits

Too strong and too fast for the quickest of wit

Inside the brain, transmitter debate

Horrid brain zaps, electric sew kit

 

The fight is not fit for the faintest of hearts

Warriors come to the battle and stay

Through all the levels, mental martial arts

Some will divert... some find their way

 

All share the same, sad ugly truth

A high price to pay to be mentally free

All will spend time in a state of uncouth

But all will defeat this Goliath with me

[manymoretodays]

Thank you Lost in Space.

[Marta]

you guys should write a book...........

[LostInSpace]

[manymoretodays]

I am going to attempt a share here from another site:

 

Meeting God in Your Self

I don’t always use the word God.
I say Universe. Or Spirit.
I do this because God is often a loaded word.
Filled with stories.
With fear.
With angst.
Filled with a history that hurts.
But in my own life, in my own head & heart…God is the word I use.
The word I use for the wholeness of it all.
The oneness.
The mighty unifying force of love.
I no longer believe in George Burns making deals on souls with a spicier version of himself.
To me, God is the all that is…God is love.

There are times when I forget that.
When I imagine that I need to beg and plead for God to show up in my life.
For love to work its magic and bring me what I want.
Desperately want.
It can be things.
People.
Clarity.
Whatever.
I want and I want and feel lost that I don’t have.
Lost that I can’t hold whatever it is I am thinking I need to make me happy.
To make me whole.
There are times when I forget that all I have to do is see the love.
Feel the love.
And step into the knowing of my wholeness.
There are times when I forget that this Adventure…my adventure…is on purpose.
By its very nature.
That my soul, my essence of the divine, has chosen this moment.
Chosen all of this.
With all of its choices.
And that I get to co-create with all that I am given.
Sometimes I forget that this moment is full of beauty.

In those moments of forgetting, I have learned to get really still.
Usually in the dark of night, snuggled up in bed.
And I listen for a moment.
Listening to the parts that rumble.
That beg.
Listening to the parts that think they need otherwise to have an amazing human experience.
Just listening.
Not yelling back at them, which is oh so tempting.
Not yelling because that makes the pattern of control spiral out.
If I can’t beg God to do what I want, then maybe I can yell at myself into stopping this ridiculous behavior.
Because I should know better, right?

The begging doesn’t work.
The yelling doesn’t work.
The listening, that works.
Or at least it creates a space.
A space in me where I can witness myself.
Where I can gain a hint of perspective.
I stand in that space.
In the relative quiet.
Moving into the gap between the noises.
It is in there that I find the truth.
And if I am willing to listen beyond the yelling and the lack and the fears then I can hear it.
Love.
Love loving every piece of me.
Even as the petulant child and the controlling diva energies play out.
Love, as me.
As my truth.
As the spark of God that flows through all of who I am.
Reminding me that there is nothing that the light doesn’t touch.
Nothing that isn’t love.
That isn’t God, in it’s own way.
All I have to let it flow.
Over me.
Through me.
To the parts that ache and yearn and seek to fix.
Not to fix them.
Not to make them better.
Not as a magic salve that somehow gives me everything I thought I needed to be ok.
Just to remind the parts that have forgotten, that they hold the spark as well.
That all is well.
That I am whole.

What if, in the moments of figuring.
Of chasing.
Of trying to make it all somehow better and different than it is.
What if you slowed down enough to listen?
To listen between the copious voices we all have in our heads?
And create space for you to once again meet the God of Love that is at the core of who you are?
What might you do with the love?
What you might you with the clarity?
What might you do when you remember who you are?

LOVE!
Jo Anna

P.S. If you dig what I wrote, I would really appreciate if you shared it!

 

And did it!  I also think she may be responsible for the concept of "self care does not equal self love".

(p.s. I am NOT Jo Anna but have followed some of her stuff)

Edited April 27, 2018 by manymoretodays

[ten0275]

so what happens to you when withdrawal loosens its grip?
when the smoldering ashes of visceral pain wisps smoke towards the firmament?
and finally you crawl from the vacuum of a desolate personal hell desert?
what happened to me?
i fell out into a new kind of technicolor.
where once an abyss tortured me,
and each breath was like wrenching air from poison water,
now scars glisten, painfully beautiful, in the sun -
and respiration's depth is limited only by the maximum capacity to inhale.
it used to be terrifying. so terrifying.
it used to be a matter of stringing one moment to the next, agonizing out the days.
tooth brush up, tooth brush down. chew the bread, chew the bread.

don't puke. you need the weight david, you need the weight.

steady hand. no let it go. let it shake.
it used to be not recognizing the face in the mirror,
and lamenting the ashen reflection slouching in the pane.
in the pain - but...
where once there was terror now resides an indomitable resolution.
in begging's stead, a conversation!
night brings not terror, no! but a silent guard...
i am fragile and i hold myself that way -
affording myself a delicate preservationist's hand
while picking up the scattered pieces of a life
dismembered, but never destroyed...

 

hang in there,

 

dave

[Cdav]

Loved the poem, Dave! 

[Wildflower0214]

so what happens to you when withdrawal loosens its grip?

when the smoldering ashes of visceral pain wisps smoke towards the firmament?

and finally you crawl from the vacuum of a desolate personal hell desert?

what happened to me?

i fell out into a new kind of technicolor.

where once an abyss tortured me,

and each breath was like wrenching air from poison water,

now scars glisten, painfully beautiful, in the sun -

and respiration's depth is limited only by the maximum capacity to inhale.

it used to be terrifying. so terrifying.

it used to be a matter of stringing one moment to the next, agonizing out the days.

tooth brush up, tooth brush down. chew the bread, chew the bread.

don't puke. you need the weight david, you need the weight.

steady hand. no let it go. let it shake.

it used to be not recognizing the face in the mirror,

and lamenting the ashen reflection slouching in the pane.

in the pain - but...

where once there was terror now resides an indomitable resolution.

in begging's stead, a conversation!

night brings not terror, no! but a silent guard...

i am fragile and i hold myself that way -

affording myself a delicate preservationist's hand

while picking up the scattered pieces of a life

dismembered, but never destroyed...

 

hang in there,

 

dave

This is fantastic. Thank you.

[LostInSpace]

Good Stuff!

[manymoretodays]

Where have all our poets gone?  Hopefully healed.  And oh, I should stress the power of getting or trying to get words out on paper.........in some, any creative way.........as far as how much it can help inrecovery/healing through W/D.  

 

And oh.............not to be confused with daily symptom/drug pattern logs.  I know I sure got confused a lot early on.   Still do.....just more of an overwhelm though now........from time to time.

 

I would love to see some more creations here.  Don't be shy.

 

Love, peace, healing/inrecovery, and growth,

mmt

Edited February 19, 2018 by manymoretodays

[Kristine]

On 20/02/2018 at 4:06 AM, manymoretodays said:

Where have all our poets gone? 

Hey MMT...I'm no poet but this is something I wrote a few years ago when practically CT off citalopram ...describing the shear terror when anxiety and panic take hold..

 

The Beast 

 

I feel like I am desperately gripping to the edge of a cliff

The waves are crashing on the jaggered rocks below

The terror is overwhelming

This beast is deliberately prising my fingers away...one by one

I don't know how much longer I can hang on 

Please god, give me strength...

I don't want to fall

[manymoretodays]

It's beautiful Kristine!  Thank you.    You haven't fallen yet!

[PoetJester]

thought i would post a couple short medication related poems of mine.

 

this first one is just a short parody of a stanza from the 1960"s pop group, the Animals song "We got to get out of this place".   It's based on my experience at a psych ward in Minneapolis when i was forced on a heavy cocktail of risperdol, prozac, and paxil where i became brain damaged and lost the ability to speak and developed akithisia where i could do no more than pace in circles all day barely able to hold my head up.  It lasted 6 months- the length of my court commitment.  

 

It's a tough world

to get a break in

When your rights

have been taken away

And the psychiatrist's need

to experiment on you

Can't be slaken     (slaken-  an old english word meaning "quenched")

 

this one is also based on those experiences.   It's entitled the "The Psychiatrist"

 

The Psychiatrist

----------------------------

His pills amount to fool's gold

His labcoat-  starched and antiseptically white

He professes to be a doctor

But he's a neuro-nazi in my sight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[PoetJester]

This next poem is based on my experience with withdrawal in 2005, where i had cold turkey'd zoloft and zyprexa.  Just a few weeks prior to going off the drugs, i had been held up at gunpoint by a group of early 20 somethings while on my way home from getting groceries one night and had my wallet stolen.  i had been only a block from my apartment complex at the time of the mugging and called the police as soon as i made it home.  Two police officers showed up and i gave them the details of mugging. 

 

 Later on,  it came up in conversation with the officers that i was taking an anti depressant (zoloft.  i was also on zyprexa).  As soon as the officer who had been taking down the report found out that i was taking zoloft, he turned to me and said "You know what?  I think you are making the whole thing up."  and threatened to have me arrested and later tried to coerce me into making a confession.  Two days later,  there was a violent assault in one of the units of the large apartment complex that i lived in.  When police investigated the assault, they found a handgun and my wallet.  i was never apologized to and the police never gave me back my wallet, claiming it as evidence.   It was with this experience fresh in my mind, that i quit the drugs a couple weeks later.  i had felt pretty good originally but eventually starting coming undone, saying "Guten tag"  and "Wie Heiss Du?"  to people i met along the walking path before  becoming really unhinged and depressed about 6 months into wd.  i ended up in group home a few months later and had to go back on the drugs as a condition of getting a room in the group home.  i stablized pretty well and began writing rhymed verse.   i had never really written much before and didn't really enjoy poetry at all in school, so it was a bit of a strange experience.   This first poem is about my experience in wd

 

What the Madman Said

---------------------------------------

              Part 1

I do not pretend to do any good works 

In the denominations of making sense or spreading kindness

But I'll tell you what i can do

I can say 'toodles' to you, pack my books, 

and eat my shoe.

             Part 2

I just talk to myself

Because i have no one 

Who believes and cleaves to me.

 

this next poem is a collection of short vignettes of my life, some real, some imagined.  i basically have treated events in my life as short news blurbs.  The title of the poem is Police Blotter.  A police blotter is just a daily record of events and other events at a police station

 

Police Blotter

----------------------

Society labels man deranged

Man replies, "So what

If from the human race i am estranged."

 

Man spends a lifetime staring out the window

Swallowing psychiatric pills against his will

Muses, "i wish i had found hunky-dory love

                   instead with a french fille."                (fille- French for 'girl')

 

Soured man reveals his burial plan

Says, "Just dig a hole and throw me in.

I don't see why the funeral parlor

Or mortuary service need to make gin."     (  "make gin' - to make a fortune)

 

Man feels better

After throwing away his television

Says, " i got tired of all the bogus hopes and false elation."