new poem

I don't know why, but I suddenly felt like putting a new poem into this blog thingy. Not sure if anyone will actually read it...

Did they take away your shoelaces?
I bet they did
Slapped on a sticky nametag
HELLO, MY NAME IS:
Rapid-cycling Bipolar I

Do you remember getting off the
Muni at north market
Watching the hexagon wall tiles
Watching the Vietnamese kids
Play kickball in the tenderloin
Watching dogs sniff asses
Because it’s so easy
Watching cracks in the pavement
With a stomach full of something
Waiting for your life to flash
Before your eyes

But there was no flash
Just kickball
& ass-sniffing
& cracked pavement
& Nothing

Do you remember the fluorescent slideshows
Snapshots of puke
& teal scrubs
& white
& white
& white

But now they have
Your shoelaces
& your humanity

& your autonomy

& you have a new name
& you are your new name
A non-person
A diagnosis

Do you remember gazing flaccidly
At the balding carpet
Pumped full of
Lithium
& Ativan
& Xanex
& Seroquel

Do you remember those
Stupid fucking posters
Of kittens telling you to
Hang in there!

Do you remember being put on “time out”
For drawing genitalia during art therapy
For starting the food fight
For refusing to cry on command
For nothing in particular

Do you remember the quiet room
Ah, yes.
The breathless white
Innocently menacing

Do you remember counting
Ceiling tiles
Floor tiles
The

Tick

Tick

Tick

Of the clock
That no one had bothered
To adjust to daylight savings time

Do you remember
Being treated like a child
Acting like a child
Feeling like a child
Turning into a child

Another success!

Do you remember the day
They returned your shoelaces
Your spiral notebooks
Your copy of The Bell Jar

Do you remember the click of locks
As they walked you through
Doors &
Doors &
Doors
Till the sky
Smacked you in the face

Do you remember getting off the
Muni at north Market
Watching the crack deals go down
Watching babushkas pushing
Shopping carts full of coke cans
Watching withered
Apocalyptic prophets
Scream to their gods
Waiting for a grown-up
To hold your hand