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Stranger

Uncredited at poet's request

I think I’m getting depressed again, I tell the stranger.

My body gets tired faster and faster, why does no one ever focus on the after?

I’m out of the woods, safe, free.

And yet I still feel like I’m lost in an eternal maze of trees.

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I don’t know what to do, I tell the stranger.

My heart hurts and I have to force myself to get up.

Get up, get up, get up, GET UP.

I don’t want to die, but I don’t want to live either.

The past clouds my brain, I’m sinking into the ether, the sea in my head.

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I don’t feel like I can trust anyone, I tell the stranger.

I’ve been hurt so many times in the past that I’m scared I’ll repeat that hurt.

I’m burnt, I’m singed, the scars remain even after all this time, a reminder of how much

kindness I lacked.

I don’t want to freak out my friends.

I don’t want to be put on suicide watch. I’m not

going to end myself, I repeat that so much.

My problems are my own. My burden is my own.

I need to manage this. Alone.

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Please forget about this, stranger.

I can only talk to you because you’ll forget.

The moon will sink, the sun will rise from the earth,

I’ll vanish from your memory like the drops of rain in the dirt

Forget me, stranger. I plead. I pray.

Forget me.

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But they just look back at me through the mirror

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Back to BoundBy: November '23 (Edition #6)

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