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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
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Posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 13:07:03
Almost 6
The sky is viciously slashed
Into a thousand thousand
Azure-blue
Diamond-shaped shreds
Of raw stratospheric meat
By the crossed wires
Of the screens
Between me
And the window pane.
The probing fingertips
Of my right hand
Wriggle into the spaces
In the steel grid
Coated
In decades
Of paint and pain,
But cannot touch
The sun-warmed glass
Beyond.My left fingers
Are hooked
Over the neck
Of a pale blue
Hospital gown
That matches the color
Of my eyes
With uncanny precision,
And helps me
Hold aloft
A wrist and forearm
With ragged furrows
Plowed
Into the veins and tendons
By a box-cutter plowshare,
Lessening
The throbbing pain
Under the dressing.I pace
Along the barrier,
Rubber-soled socks
Padding like paws
On gold-flecked
Squares of white linoleum,
Bathrobe dangling
Like a cape
Because I'm still
Under watch,
And the ribbon of fabric
That serves as the belt
Is kept
Beyond my grasp
Like the late-spring air
Just inches away,
Just a billion miles
Away.A clock hanging high
On the wall,
Protected from me
By a bubble
Of plastic,
Ticks closer
And closer
To 6 p.m.,
When the visitors
Will file in
And the petting zoo
Will open
With us
As the featured
Attractions.My eyes trail down
To find Eleanora
Watching me,
All of 16,
Her long blond hair
Matted and tangled
Like my own
Dark thatch.
We both arrived,
Life's roadkill,
Late the same
Wednesday night,
Massive steel doors
Sliding shut behind us,
Letting us know,
In the quietly thunderous language
Of metal,
That we were now
Officially citizens
Of the ward.
Jesus, I'd thought,
She's just a kid,
As we slumped on a bench
For an entrance interview
With a nurse,
Both of us
Wrapped
In worn blankets
Against the chill
Permeating every inch
Of our tiny new world.Dozens of minute slashes
Decorated her wrists,
The unique ritual scarring
Of the tribe
To which
We now belonged.
Her cuts
Were too shallow
To strike the mother lode
Of blood in the
Delicate blue filaments
Wending their way
Up from her hands
To her elbows.Almost exactly half my age,
But our expressions identical,
Stunned to find
That the paths
Of our lives
Had led us
To such a place.
"Is it just me," I finally said,
"Or do you feel
Like we just joined the cast
Of 'Girl Interrupted'?"
A smile
Split a face
Carrying eyes puffy
From crying,
Radiant
In the shadowy corridor.
And we chattered,
In hushed tones
Suitable for a church,
About how utterly bizarre
It was
That we'd ended up
On this bench.Yet oddly,
In the days
That have followed,
I sometimes find
Something
Oddly liberating
About this place,
Where I feel
So child-like,
Where virtually everything
Is completely beyond
My control.
We're told when to get up,
When to sleep,
When to eat,
When to shower,
And handed
Little paper cups of meds
From a cart,
As if they were treats
From the Good Humor man,
Distributed by nurses
Who smile and nod
Reassuringly.
I tell Eleanora
The cart should play music
And ring a little bell
To bring us running,
And she likes this idea.But now
It's almost 6,
And Eleanora
Pats my right arm,
Her shiny little scabs
Catching bits of sunlight,
Because she knows
How anxious
I get
When this hour
Rolls around
And I may
Have to face
My family
And try
To explain
All this.She unhooks my fingers
From the screen
Like someone loosening
The claws of a cat,
Taking my hand
And giving it
A sisterly squeeze.
Her gray-blue eyes,
Made slightly hazy
By her meds,
Speak silently,
Telling me
I'll be OK,
They won't hate me,
They won't fear me,
They won't reject me,
But still,
I find myself torn
Between longing to see them
And hoping
They'll never come
And see me
Like this.I grin, just a little,
When I notice
She's toting the cartoon
I drew with crayons
Of her pet rat
In a monocle,
Top hat, and tails.
"I can't wait
To show my mom,"
She says,
And skitters toward
The great steel doors
By the reception area.
I hear the electronic buzz
As the doors open and shut,
Open and shut,
To let people in,
Knowing that if I were there,
I'd glimpse
The security guard
Standing
Just beyond them
In my old world.I shuffle
From the window
Down the corridor
And turn a corner
To unexpectedly
Find myself
Mere feet
From my mother
And my sister,
Their backs to me
As orderlies
Search the bags
Of clothing
They've brought
To replace
The shirt cut off me
In the ER,
And the discarded jeans
Stiffened with dried maroon blood.We catch sight
Of each other,
And I almost
Turn and run,
Wrestling with this impulse
As they stare
At a face once familiar
Now recast
In an alien glow,
A "Close Encounters
Of the Third Kind" moment
Tinged both
With intense curiosity
And a flicker
Of dread.We move toward a table
In the cafeteria,
The eyes and ears
Of parent and sibling
Darting and listening
To the other families
For cues
About how
To handle
This conversation.Eleanora runs up
With her mother in tow,
Flashing the cartoon
And introducing me.
I self-consciously
Move my left arm
Behind my back
And warily
Shake her mother's hand.
"See what he drew for me?"
She asks,
Displaying the picture,
And my own mother's reaction
Finally leads me
To lower my guard.
In the artwork,
She sees
A piece of the past,
The sketch a roadmap
Back to known
And shared territory,
Something her son
Used to do
For his little brother
On long car trips.My mother extends her hand
Tentatively
And grips my own.
"How do you feel?"
She asks,
And,
My eyes damp,
All I can think
To answer is
"Better."
-- Atticus
Posted by malthus on August 10, 2004, at 19:09:50
In reply to poem ... Almost 6, posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 13:07:03
Thanks for posting Almost 6. Once again your poem inspired me to write something which for me is a way to "purge" emotionally.
Posted by Jai Narayan on August 10, 2004, at 19:32:23
In reply to poem ... Almost 6, posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 13:07:03
I love this poem. How many times can I repeat "I love this poem"?
But I must repeat this phrase...I love this poem.
I want to send a copy to my sister who has shared this experience with you.
She cut her throat...right across the neck and she cut both wrists with a razor. They say you can't cut both wrists but she did. She needed hours in micro surgery to reconnect the tiny nerves.
My sister is the oldest of my siblings. I was then and am now very close to her.
She was a decade older than my uncle (who was the oldest sibling in my mother's family) when he cut his jugular. He was a doctor and knew the correct proceedure to be sucessful.
I don't know if this has happened in every generation of my family or if it was just started with my uncle.
So this story strikes a familiar chord for me and that you are alive and able to profoundly share about this...well it's quite a gift.
Thank you again. I hope you never tire of my support and appreciation.
Posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 19:36:22
In reply to Re: poem ... Almost 6 » Atticus, posted by malthus on August 10, 2004, at 19:09:50
You're not alone in that. Writing about the psych ward in "Almost 6" or the actual suicide attempt in "Spots" were both positive ways to express my thoughts about some very dark moments and "cleanse" my mind a little in the process. It can take a lot out of a body, but the sense of release, as you observe, is worth it. Atticus
Posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 20:17:15
In reply to Re: poem ... Almost 6 ****Trigger****, posted by Jai Narayan on August 10, 2004, at 19:32:23
I'll never tire of getting your feedback or of responding to it, Jai. No need to fear that. Atlanteans stick together. This was sort of the "bookend" poem to "Spots," which, as you may remember, details my efforts to get help when I realized the enormity of what I'd done, and includes a pretty graphic description of the actual suicide attempt. It's strange, as I observe in "Almost 6," to be part of this odd, secret tribe to which I and your sister belong. I think seeing the marks on Eleanora's wrists really jolted me because of her age. But we formed a very close friendship during the time we were both in the ward. I refer to this as my "Lost in Translation" friendship (if you haven't seen this movie with Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson, I highly recommend it), where a man and a much younger woman -- both suffering from an intense sense of psychic, emotional, and physical dislocation -- form a powerful platonic bond. I felt very protective of her, yet often it was she who came to my emotional rescue in that strange, strange place, where everyone somehow ends up feeling like they're the same age. I hope your sister is doing well these days, and you continue to succeed at fending off any urge to follow in either her or my footsteps. I'm the oldest sib in my family; I sometimes wonder if the extra pressure to succeed placed on first children (which was certainly the case with me, though it eventually backfired and brought about a state of complete rebelliousness) makes us more susceptible to doing these kinds of things if the chemicals in our brain are a bit dicey to begin with. Though there's tons of mental illness coming down my father's line of the family, as far as I know, I'm the only one who has the dubious distinction of attempting suicide. I also wonder if there's any significance to the violent and bloody methodology that "cutters" like your sister and I brought to the task, or if it's just a matter of what's available. Last fall, in a period of about two weeks, three people in New Jersey laid down on commuter rail lines and killed themselves that way, and I considered it, but in the end thought it made too public a spectacle of the act. You referred earlier to how methodical your sister was in her attempt, and I was too, even pulling out my copy of "Gray's Anatomy" (purchased to help with my drawing) to study the arrangement of veins in the wrist and forearm. In that warped state of perception, it all really does feel like problem-solving. Please do keep writing, even if it's just to chat about whatever's on your mind on the Psycho-Social-Babble page. :) Atticus
Posted by Jai Narayan on August 10, 2004, at 21:28:51
In reply to Re: poem ... Almost 6 ****Trigger**** » Jai Narayan, posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 20:17:15
When I am at work and turn a vitamin bottle in my hand to read the label for a customer then my silver lines appear on my tiny wrists. Some of the tracks are across the wrist some of them run down the length of the vein.
You see I was part of the group that needed a quick exit. I was overwhelmed with pain and saw no other way to deal.
My mother used to encourage me to kill myself, I know that is shocking but it's true. So being her daughter I wanted to suceed as well.Honestly I have had therapy on my mother.
I am still so moved by her...that woman that brought me into this world. That cold teat that wouldn't feed me. The ice queen. We all called her that.
but all that ended...she has died. I honestly doubted she would. But she did.
My god she did.
Oh Atticus...oh goodness.
Posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 21:55:43
In reply to Re: poem ... Almost 6 ****Trigger****, posted by Jai Narayan on August 10, 2004, at 21:28:51
Oh Jai, oh God, I never suspected. I must be blind. It must have taken immense courage to write that last post. I'm so sorry that you too bear the scars of initiation into this pain-wracked tribe. But at the same time, I'm so glad we found each other on this site. My poems are, on one level, a way of bleeding without cutting. I think that's one reason I keep turning them out so frequently right now; the three lines running along veins in my left wrist and forearm are still fresh and red and angry-looking. I wrap an ace bandage around them to conceal them every morning before work. But you've no need to conceal your wounds, physical and emotional, from me. We both survived the physical cuts, but the emotional ones never seem to close up entirely, do they? Just walk this road with me. We can hold each other up when the path gets too steep. Atticus
Posted by Jai Narayan on August 10, 2004, at 22:54:06
In reply to Re: poem ... Almost 6 ****Trigger**** » Jai Narayan, posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 21:55:43
You are so sweet. Yes we can be there for one
another. You are so much closer to the fire than me.
I have made a clear decision not to cut anymore.
For the first time in my long life I am no longer needing that release.
I can live a long life with the twists and turns life can deal. I am free from my mother and the cruel barbs. I am now my own person and I allow myself a good long life full of love and dancing and poems.
I extend that to you dear friend. I grant you a long fruitful life filled with the lust of loving and your wonderful art.
I want the day when you put your hands on a lump of clay and mold it into a cup or a bowl. A work of love.
You are so much what life and love is about. I want you to have what you need and want.
I am in the club but I am moving into the future filled with hope and love. Please follow, like the white rabbit. We are full of life.
Posted by malthus on August 11, 2004, at 7:35:37
In reply to Re: poem ... Almost 6 » malthus, posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 19:36:22
Atticus: Thank you for being the only person on this board who replied to me about my first poem and welcoming me. Also thank you for replying about the creative process and how it's affected by mental health issues. I think I'll go try my hand at writing a limerick ;)
Posted by Jai Narayan on August 11, 2004, at 8:51:06
In reply to Re: poem ... Almost 6, posted by malthus on August 11, 2004, at 7:35:37
I hope you post the limerick. I'm still stalled on how I can do one.
Sorry I didn't respond to your poem, sometimes I get worried about dominating this site with all my posts.
I love this site and all the poems.
welcome to writing babble.
This is the end of the thread.
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