Written by Julie Everson

My name is Julie and I wrote these poems from the depth of my pain and anguish. After much writing I am finally shining light on the darkest places in me. I feel as though my mental illness is trapping me in a cage. I don’t know the level of recovery I can achieve but am grateful for words to help me escape. I wrote Lobotomy while under extremely high stress levels.

I feel that there are others suffering as I do, feeling alone in their own world. I write to reach out to you.

Pitter patter, pitter patter
Dropping like rain
Sun peeking between weightless clouds to shine through a drop upon a leaf
Imagining I’m in a place that’s so beautiful my eyes cant stand to see
Brilliant vibrant colours rushing at me
Streaming through my eyes
I pretend I’m not alone in this empty grey room
Where faces peer through the door with clipboards
And they laugh at me
Write down all my mistakes and what life could have been
I pretend that I’m you in a life so normal and mundane
So simply happy
No anguish everyday
I pretend that I have enough and am not always in desperate need
Its just too much for me to exist this week
I see the rainbow and the waterfall so thin
So its weak enough to stand under it
Without getting swept away
But still strong enough to sweep over your hair and cascade down your face
I pretend I’m there and not alone in this empty place
The walls are so thin I can hear the screams and cries
Scraped so raw and stretched so thin
In here we wait to die
And there is no where to hide from the eyes that pry
I struggle to compose my facial gestures
Not let anxiety transform my gentle face
Into a hideous grimace
As I try and hold down these 90ft walls of sheer pain
I watch them congratulate one another on each accomplishment
I’ve been frozen here so long
I can now only twitch
I hit my face off the grey walls of my mind
I am trapped in here
I try to give people directions to find me
But they get lost just past the gate
I let them in further and trust them
And they pierce me in a new place
Riddled with holes and unkempt
I remember how happy I was as a carefree kid
I try to recapture a sense of freewill
A moment so divine
When I wasn’t chained in here
Memories didn’t leave me frozen in time
A little girl searching through a Christmas wish book
Circling things and hoping they’d arrive
New things to hold in my arms and call mine
I hold my head in my hands
I bite on my lip so the pain I can withstand
Why do I hurt so much I do not know
Why am I locked in here
How do I ever open the door
My insides feel so twisted by pain
Sit with me awhile and let’s play a game
Its called escape and I must do it eventually
Break out of this prison I’ve created just for me
I hear myself screaming in the other room
He is beating me again
Fists that anger has consumed
A little girl is crying
Her daddy doesn’t care
He terrifies her
She always feels so scared
None of this is an excuse to be locked away
But she is guarded now and always kept safe
No one can touch her now that wolves guard the gates
But they will rip her to shreds too
So she imagines a place
A little boat on which she floats away
The cool air brushes over her face
She closes her eyes and rocks in her little boat over caressing waves
She opens her eyes to the nights sky and marvels how the stars surround every inch of space
But she always awakes alone in this room
In this empty space
Trying to reach out and touch others
But she always hides away
Because people can’t really see her
Just an empty face
A grimace of pain
Deep brown eyes
That float on her face
Tears fill them if she feels
So she has put up such a blockade
One day Superman will come pick her up
Out of herself
And he will carry her away

Lobotomy

My mental state is withering away
like ashes blowing on the breeze of a late summers day
Smoldering embers left from dancing flames.
One inch from fading away
Washed out, amber eyes try to face another day
I’ve begun fraying at the edges
Singing softly in public to myself
Seeing things that aren’t really there
Shadows that creep along the edge of my vision but when I look they disappear
Jumping at my reflection as I pass by mirrors
Talking to the strangers in my head
Its ok Julie, close your eyes
Full frontal lobotomy
Just a little pull, just a little twitch
Sit me in the corner
I can drool and bleed
Forget the pain you’ve given to me
Show me those smiling faces in the $300 family portraits
Where the mommy doesn’t cry and the daddy does not scream
And their white teeth
They gleam
The shame that I’m not meant to be
A portrait of mental stability
I erase myself infinitely
Standing in the remains of who I tried to be
Crying as I fall away from what was left of me
Like turning my face up to a brilliant sun shower only to have acid rain burn trails down my face
Shocked and scarred
I’m the remains of a dysfunctional life and family
I disappear now running, paranoia is chasing me
Through empty blocks and shadowy streets
Have to be stronger then I have the means to be
Or watch the wind sweep away what means most to me
My soul screams at me, do not let this be
I am broken and dazed carried so far away from what I dreamed life could be
How can I go on living with this hollowed person inside of me
My full frontal lobotomy
The shadows come to life
They are becoming me
I reach my hand into the deep well of fucks I used to give
I come up empty
All that’s left is a nicotine stain
A skid mark on the road of my life where semi trucks hit
Am I angry, am I sad?
Does it matter any more?
Can I fake acting glad long enough to socialize
Or should I just shut the door not open it anymore
Pain sewed my heart up and now I reside
In a cell of mistrust where time slips through my fingers like sand
Everything breaks and I wind up walking through shards of glass
Yearning to run away
Again desperate
Again consumed
Judged and ignored
A pretty face that can’t take one shot more
Busted up and broken down
Paranoid like a cat up a tree
I can’t come down
What’s left of me is a overwhelmed scared rag doll
They tore off my arms
Sew up my eyes
My body is sinking, sinking into the abyss
What I needed was so small
Just genuine love and arms to hold me
Protect me when I fall
But the arms weren’t really there at all
I fell, I fall, I’m sick of it all
Falling right through me to you
I am a ghost to you
Unsticky glue
A substance detached from human beings
Digging deep
The earliest bonds broken left me always in need
Too afraid to be misunderstood and hurt again
Left out in the freezing rain of my soul
So antisocial I feel like I’m frozen
Coasting through these stares emboldened
Superman I’m broken
Steel inside but the molten lava is penetrating
My fortress
This pain leaves me always falling
Is there a happy ending for this complex being?
Yes it’s my full frontal lobotomy
Vanish with me into a world of endless dreams
Where it doesn’t matter if everything breaks
Like Lego smashed and scattered in disarray
Because nothing is real anyways.

Image credit: Andy Rothwell

Julie Everson enjoys writing, reading, scrabble and public speaking. She loves music and her favourite band is The Tragically Hip. She loves cooking and wishes she had a dishwasher. She is beginning her journey of sharing her story of her struggle with a personality disorder. She hopes to continue speaking and being an inspiration to people. 

To check out all of Julie’s guest posts on MHT, click here.