Coffee Shop Thoughts

Suicidal depression is a strange thing.

You go about your day,
make small talk with the barista at the coffee shop
and look normal, perhaps

and no one knows how intimately you know Death
how you commune with Her on a weekly basis
how frequently you must negotiate with Her,
trying to convince Her to give you more time

So strange how I can somehow blend into casual spaces
while fighting a vicious battle for my life.

*If you are in the US, feel this way, and need someone to talk to, call 988 for the national suicide hotline. You are not alone.




Blood Into Gold

When I was a young teenager,
I was suicidal.
Now,
I work on a crisis hotline
helping others who are suicidal.
I wish I could go back in time
and show my younger self
what she would become.
“Look,” I’d say.
“I know how hard it is for you right now.
I know you feel lost, broken, and alone,
and that everything seems hopeless.
But you will make something
of this pain.
It won’t be for nothing.
Look how you’ll spin
the blood
into gold.”