longing

March 7 2017

is that you?

susangayhart Poetry alone, clinical depression, death, depressed, depression signals, grief, longing, Major Depressive Disorder, mental health, mental illness, myketaminestory, suicidal depression, suicide, treatment resistant depression

I plunge to my death
Shadows linger behind me
Could it be you?
I feel I’m getting closer,
Closer to you
I like the comfortable feeling
I’m experiencing
It seems so long since I’ve been near you
I began to fear the distance
I wanted, still want to be with you
I have missed you,
Longed to be with you
I find myself fading from this life
I’m not scared, for I know you’ll be there
You’ll be there to protect me
And we will be together again
I can see but it is very blurry
I’m confused…..
I wonder as a figure is being sketched
Before my eyes
Is that you?
Is that you, Grandma?
I run….
To safety, to love, to you
Oh how I have missed you
Everything is dim
Black
I’m lost

SEG

3/2/91

*Most of the poetry posted on my website was written during my teens and twenties. There are a few exceptions but typically I find myself wanting to journal regularly and write poetry if inspired. Poetry has been my therapist during many trying times. I have decided to post these poems because it reflects my history with suicidal depression and the struggles I encountered trying to cope with life and depression.

March 4 2017

a bond

susangayhart Poetry clinical depression, friendships, hope, lonely, longing, Major Depressive Disorder, sadness

Tomorrow
Will my life change?
Will there be a man
With a soft touch- gentle?
Will there be a deep look
An emotional grip
That his smile would send
Through me?
Will his love surround me
On cold nights
Or when I am scared and
Alone?
Will things end
Just when I feel secure?
Will I look to him
Only to see him glance down and away?
If I reach for him
Will I find him gone?
What would I do then?
I need a bond
Strong as an ocean waves
Tight as skin to bones
Special like a sunset
Mine to cherish
For all the tomorrow’s
To come.

SEG

March 3 2017

everything

susangayhart Poetry death, depression, faith, hope, longing, losing, love, relationships, voices

I see you in everything
I see your face
I hear your laughter
While I look in the mirror
I see your warm, unforgettable
Smile
Others don’t see it
But they don’t have to
For me to know you’re
There
I remember the words
And the words
Unspoken
I think of the things –
Things I have said
Words I wish I’d said
And the language I hoped
I would never say.
Everywhere I go
You are inside me
You make me feel alive
And dead
All at the same time
Often I think of you
And I wonder to myself
Are you a fantasy
A dream
To unreal to believe in?
But yet I do
I believe in you
I know you exist
No one has to see you
Hear you
or
even touch you
For me
You are everything
And nothing at all.

SEG

*2/6/92

1:30am

February 26 2017

can’t walk it off

susangayhart Poetry alone, anxiety, autumn, clinical depression, colors, depressed, depression signals, foliage, fresh air, help, insight, insomnia, longing, Major Depressive Disorder, meditation, mental illness, myketaminestory, observing, panic attacks, running, sadness, self aware, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, walking, winter

Whenever I’m depressed or anxious
I’ll sometimes take a long walk
which allows me to contemplate my life

Walking in the autumn is I find especially nice
looking at all the different colored leaves
but discovering no comfort for winter will soon arrive

I try breathing in the fresh air
attempting to live for the moment
I could walk forever wishing I could quiet my mind

I long to stroll without a care in the world
but as I roam down the street the issues
race through my head obsessively

I don’t possess the ability to turn off my mind
It’s such a dilemma to me, not being aware
how to solve my problems and deal with my past

Yearning desperately that I could merely
walk it off, but realistically I recognize
the depression, my illness will still be there

There are times when I figure a way to cope
a strategy or solution may occur to me
but never can I just walk it off or disappear
SEG

February 23 2017

deception

susangayhart Poetry affairs, alone, anxiety, clinical depression, deception, desire, emotional affair, insight, lies, lonely, longing, loving, Major Depressive Disorder, meditation, mental health, mental illness, myketaminestory, panic attacks, relationships, sadness, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, support, symptoms, treatment resistant depression

I hurt the one that I love immensely
I am ashamed of, and very angry too
could it be that my illness caused it?
I did so many actions that I can undo
carried out too many unforgivable things

Can he or I ever forgive myself for my conduct?
the reasons for my deception hurts inside
I devoted myself to man in marriage
why did I break that commitment to him?
was it because I thought he didn’t care?

I believed that he didn’t understand my mental illness
that the love we once shared so deeply
was no longer in existence, plainly dead
did I destroy a relationship I treasured?
morally I let go of what was meaningful to me

I went looking for others for the support and love
how can he ever pardon the affair when I know
that his heart is breaking from half a world away
will our marriage withstand all that I have done
or will it end in a wicked and ugly divorce?
SEG

February 21 2017

insightful

susangayhart Poetry anxiety, clinical depression, conversations, depressed, depression signals, ECT, fault, guilt, hate, help, hurt, longing, lost, love, Major Depressive Disorder, mental health, mental illness, observing, panic attacks, remembering, sadness, self aware, side effects, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, treatment resistant depression, treatments

When I first met you, I was extremely ill
but you looked into my blue eyes,
eyes that I figure hide everything
all my pain, all my anger, my entire life
yet you could see that I had no childhood

You were correct, I was robbed of the laughter,
the enjoyment all the things a child should have
I grew up resentful, alone and feeling awful
I thought that every dreadful episode was my fault and guilt
accompanied every event in my life, even before I was able to fight back

I really don’t know how you knew these things
when I was an expert at disguising what lie inside
you could see my inner soul when others couldn’t
tears came because of my broken heart, you said
I must have felt safe with you to be so open

I would love to know, to remember
all the conversations we have had
I pray daily for my memory to return
I practice every chance I get not to be so upset
at the devastating fact that I can’t recall any of them

I do thank you for having the recollections that you do
I listen closely for words, stories, incidents
that may trigger my mind into the past months
so far nothing has been restored to me
but with your caring and sharing, maybe one day
SEG

February 20 2017

lost

susangayhart Poetry alone, anger, baggage, communication, death, depressed, friendships, grief, insight, issues, longing, lost, relationship, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, tears, treatment resistant depression, trust

The anger that’s inside me
oh, how the anger within me is on fire
I often wonder if I’ll ever find
the water to diminish it

The relationship between us
It just not right
the tension, oh the awful tension
sends flames straight to the sky

I’m lost, so lost as to what to do
what is there to do?
our communication is extinct
and there are many words left unspoken

I feel such fear, too much fear
that all I can do is brush away the tears
If the air is not cleared soon
what will happen to us?

Will the trust ever be restored
or should I head for the door
luggage in both hands
with no future plans, except maybe death?
SEG

February 19 2017

memories

susangayhart Poetry agoraphobia, alone, antidepressants, anxiety, choices, doctors, ECT, hate, longing, Major Depressive Disorder, mental health, mental illness, misinformed, myketaminestory, observing, OCD, painful, panic attacks, sadness, self aware, stolen, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, terror, treatment resistant depression, treatments

The panic I feel when things don’t go as planned
I can’t breathe, think or know how to react
my memory it does not help or ease the fright
and that sense of anger overwhelms me
due to my choice to have electro convulsive therapy

I want to recall with all my might to be able
to reminiscence and have the knowledge I lost
it upsets me to no end all that’s gone
when others say that it is alright in time it will return
what they don’t realize is it didn’t happen to them

It’s not fine what I have forfeited because of my choice
the doctors, everyone I talk to tell me that eventually
someday I’ll recollect all that was stolen from me
until that day or moment when it’s supposed to occur
how do I handle all the anxiety and depression I feel

I want back what I perceive I can’t have
nevertheless I deserve to possess each and every event
that has been seized from me, I can’t stop obsessing about it
even though I agreed to under go shock treatment
It’s causing me such distress, it’s eating me alive
SEG

February 14 2017

gone crazy

susangayhart Poetry acceptance, alone, antidepressants, clinical depression, dying, fear, friendships, gone crazy, grief, haunts, laughing, lonely, longing, mental health, mental illness, myketaminestory, observing, panic attacks, sadness, self aware, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, treatment resistant depression, unhappy, voices

My heart is dying inside
what does all this mean?
nothing really just reassuring me
no one could truly love me
I’m not worthy of unconditional love

Because you see those that have tried
leave so unhappily most of the time
I often wonder why that is
why can’t people accept who I am?
oh! it must be my personality

no need to cry the tears will never
wash away the pain that’s locked up inside
will it all end in suicide?
are the images I see, are they really laughing at me?
the whispers I hear, they frighten me so

The voices that haunt me
they won’t stop, so I obsess
about what I hear, have I gone crazy?
I’m scared and feel so empty
why do I turned everyone away?
SEG

February 12 2017

today

susangayhart Poetry anxiety, birds, depression signals, ending, grief, gun, hospitalizations, lonely, longing, Major Depressive Disorder, mental health, mental illness, my world, myketaminestory, nature, observing, panic attacks, peace, sadness, singing, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, treatment resistant depression, voices

Things have changed for me now
each day now, all I feel is death
I’m aware of only the loneliness and terror
the days and nights
are so unbearable and horrifying

I find pleasure in nothing
why did this have to occur
just when I figured I had improved so?
that the illness had let go of me
but it’s much worse then I could imagine

The colors of the leaves
means nothing to me now
to me they seem rusty brown
even in the spring and summer
I experience nothing of beauty I once saw

I hear no birds singing sweetly outside
nothing but silence in the nature
I try to listen, but all that is there
are the voices in my head
telling me this is the end

My world changed and
Inside I am slowly fading
I’m certain I’ll be joining
The unknown, today
as I hold a gun to my head
SEG