Dictionary poetry

Backbite - Beatific

A sad chapter.
TW: Addiction, death mention, schizophrenia

Backbite // Rowan
Do you remember when we were still good?
I sometimes do and it hurts a little bit more every time, I always seem to stray further day by day.
I remember spending time in the Sunday sun with you, we read books in the quiet, played video games, and road bikes racing our way to seven eleven.
Do you remember what it was like to not know that feeling? That feeling I cannot seem to ever stop relentlessly searching for and have proven incapable of finding and I can't unknow it.
Do you remember when our parents used to yell at us for eating too much candy? They would smile as they yelled because problems so small are just too good not to smile about.
Remember when they stopped calling and letting us over? They don't look at me anymore, and I don't blame them, I'm a funeral waiting to be had, and a sad story that has an all too predictable ending.
Do you remember when drinking on a Saturday night was nothing more than that, when this wasn't the entirety of our existence? The bottle hung in the apartment for months and now we are replacing them far too often to really know how many empty bottles we have created.
Remember when you weren't shaking? Remember when I didn't wake up sick and thinking about how I was going to get it in me as fast as possible?
I hate our nightstands because yours always has a bottle and mine always has a bag.

Backstage // Rowan
How can I fill myself today? How can I find it? How can I hide it?
The high pokes holes in a person and I slip out through them until there's nothing left.
But maybe if I did more, maybe if I did it faster, maybe if I added something else, maybe if I tried something else, and this time it will fill me, and it never does, I'm just as hollow as I was before, maybe a little more this time.
I need some money for gas. I'm going on a walk by myself. Don't worry about it.
How dilated can your pupils be before people see through them? How can I conceal the body that tells the story? What lie is believable here?
I have to paint my face into something human, I promise there's some left.

Baleful // Rowan
Just one more time? For me, I know you miss me.
We both know the high died and will not be resurrected but this is better than the hollow feeling within you.
Remember when the sensation was otherworldly? Of course, it won't be ever again, and you are only digging yourself into a deeper grave by trying. Still it's worth remembering and fighting for.
I can mend things, really, I've caused more destruction than you deemed yourself capable of, but that feeling is a God. At least, to you it is, you don't know God, you won't either.
I am divine, wear me around your neck, pray to me, dedicate your entire existence to me until you're nothing.
All you do is become more of nothing and no one, you hide from the world, you stop participating, you stop being a person.
I am all you have left, a small part of you can wish to leave, but you never will.
In the end there will be nothing left, that's how this story goes for every one of you, it begins as something holy and leads you to your grave, I'll see you there honey.

Ball of fire // AJ
When we were children me and Sunday were each other's only friends, and make no mistake there was no perception of a lack, we were molded into each other's perfect playmate.
When it's December and I have nothing to protect me from the biting cold I think of those days, those days of gummy worms, bike rides, ghost stories, and days spent picking up rocks at the river.
As time spun and peeled back layers of paint I think we both realized that something within us was unlike our peers.
I remember our mutual shock when we came to understand that most people hear one voice in their head, I will never forget the way he smiled and said "Yeah right, that's crazy!" The room was quiet, so quiet that it only created more isolated quiet rooms, but we had each other.
Sunday was always bad at appearing anything but odd and crazy, I don't know if masking ever crossed his mind as a possibility, and truthfully I don't know if he could do it, even if he wanted to.
When I would stay up all night watching these so-called false perceptions I would tell Sunday about the beauty I saw in my bedroom ceiling, and when Sunday saw beautiful things in his bedroom ceiling he would tell me, his family, the kids at school, and strangers at the grocery store.
He had no sense of self protection, nothing in him told him to keep these stories written in locked diaries, it was never his fault that he couldn't hide it and it was never my fault that I could.
After highschool, Sunday went from odd to dysfunctional, he was unsettling to the general population, he was always rocking himself and in conversation, even when no one was really there.
I was the only one who really enjoyed his company after that, I only found more things to adore, he was happy and endearing like he always was, I never understood why people found him overwhelming, he was the same Sunday, just a little more sick and a little more scared.
Loving a schizophrenic is unlike anything I've ever known. He hands me a strange shape made out of half baked clay, "this is for you." I wear it around me neck, to him he's protecting me from countless evil spirits, and to me it's just an ugly necklace, but Sunday is always worth it.

Bare // AJ
I stand in front of Sunday's red door. This is the only red one in the house, I never knew why but I always figured it was the home's way of electing him the crazy one.
I remain still, I hear him talking to something or someone, he seems horrified. I hold my breath for a minute and count then step into his bedroom.
It is a disaster zone, there are countless items spread across his floor, every inch is dirty, aside from the perfect collection of empty bottles of purple shampoo.
He doesn't notice I'm here, his face is red from crying, he is clawing at his skin again.
"Hey Sunday? Is everything alright?"
He looks up at me horrified, tears stream down his face faster, he is in terror. He is bleeding on his arms and legs, he continues to scratch them. "AJ, go away, they will get you too!"
He always cares, even when he is ill.
"Sunday someone told me about this pill that makes the bugs fall out and go live somewhere else." I look across the room exaggerating my causality, I sign and smile. "Underground? I don't want them to get Adeline!" I smile at him, "How'd you know?" He looks at me innocently and chews the pill between his teeth.
"What is it called?" "Olanzapine."
He looks like he is breathing for the first time, everything in him just took a sign of relief.
He stands up and hugs me tightly, I rock him side to side for a long moment.
"I love you AJ, I love you so much."

Beatific
Do you think that despite everything within you that believes you will spend your entire life rotting, that you will find peace one day? I think so.
You are always trying to be better, to find joy and peace within yourself, you've known it at your core, you can find it again.
Maybe now you are rotting, maybe you can hear sounds of decay coming from your stomach, maybe your sanity is dripping away, and maybe you will survive it, like you always do.
You always do, you have so many times, and you will do it again, believe me.
Maybe the fear in your eyes is for different reasons, maybe the stories are told differently, but you are another person who is scared sometimes, just like everyone else.
There are beautiful things you don't even know about, answers that you haven't yet found, there is so much joy that you cannot even comprehend yet.
You are human, you are alive, you are real, despite what your mind tells you. When the sun sets you are just another human being who is struggling.