Blue Skies

Chapter 1 [Abelia]

Chapter 1 [Abelia]

Author's note: Warning, quite triggering. All poems written by me.

Winter – November

“I watch blue skies

fade to grey.

Colder days

shorter nights.

“String down the halls are Christmas lights

Cold in the days and colder by nights

Warm and cozy; Spirit and cheer everywhere

Who knew what news this season could bear?”

                * * *

That’s the winter

we didn’t go anywhere.

Sleepless nights as harsh as the winds.

I hoped that this was all a dream

and on Christmas Eve

I’d wake up

and everything would be better than it really was.”

A.V.

I sighed and signed my initials on the bottom. My neat cursive writing flowed all across the notebook paper as I clutched my favorite ink pen. Every winter I would write one more poem about the winter I had been diagnosed. The winter where I didn’t leave the house, much less my room, no matter how many time my parents had urged me to go and play, since “all the other children” were out in the snow.

Every winter my poems would get better, but they still held the same old story behind it. I had the same empty lingering feeling in the middle of my chest as my gaze remained blankly on my newly written poem. Sleepless nights were right, since my ancient pocket watch was telling me it was 4:25am.  Should I be taking anymore sleeping pills? I want to be able to function tomorrow morning, since though it was winter, we had school.

Oh wait, I had forgotten that I threw my pills out the window when I had a panic attack and was crying myself to sleep. Almost succeeded in the sleep part too, but then my brain had to remind me that today was the day I should be writing my annual ‘sad poem’.

The exact date to be precise was not until a little more than a week later, but today was November 3rd, the day my dad died. Just days before my mother’s birthday I might add, which was on November 6th. I remember how I felt during the painful days that followed my father’s death, and I remember staying up writing and writing, tears smudging the ink on my paper. My trash bin was over flooded with crumpled paper of every size the next day, and I didn’t sleep a wink. I fought my lack of sleep with coffee and tea, downing cup after cup of the bitter liquid. To be fair, without the bitter, the sweet just isn’t as sweet.

Rereading my poem, I underlined words that stood out to me.

Blue skies.

Grey.

Colder.

Shorter.

Sleepless.

Harsh.

Wake up.

In every single one of my ‘sad poems’ I could always find exact words to describe my condition. My fingers shook and the ink from my pen splotched onto the paper as I read out the description in my head.

“Blue skies that turned grey, just like my clouded thoughts that ramble like thunder and lightning.”

“Colder and shorter the days become as I cease to look forward to tomorrow, much less yesterday.”