Depresso Espresso Poetry

Death by Chosen Solace

It’s cold. Freezing.
Icy needles burning my skin.
I ignore. Underneath, the soft sand sinks and rises around my ankles with the coming tide.

It’s closing in. 
That which had been a cool breeze, gently ruffling my hair, transforms into a fierce wind, biting at my neck and face as I stray further out.

I look up.
The sky is dark now,
and any trace of the sunset
I had been admiring
merely an hour ago, is gone.

I look up, but the pale glow of the moon is the only illumination against the icy blackness enveloping across the world for as far as my eyes can strain to see.

I look up, expecting stars, clouds, desperately searching for some beautiful sight. Desperately searching for a reason. But. No matter how hard I strain, I cannot see.

Not a reason, not a cloud, not one shining star. Any hope I held is gone. I guess it’s quite fitting, in a way that sends a sick chill through my spine, and stings like a dagger in my heart.

Finally, I reach the point where my head is the only part of me
still above the sea. I take a last look, somewhat disappointed,
then continue.

I sink slowly, my hair a slave to the currents, the rocks in my pockets dragging me under. It’s calm. So calm. This is the nice part. If any part of this can be considered nice.

My contemplation is interrupted by the urge to breathe in. I resist it for as long as I can, but eventually I can no longer fight it. Water fills my lungs. It burns. Ohh it burns.

I feel myself screaming, but I barely make a sound, Hundreds of Air bubbles escape, clawing their way to the surface. It’s agony, blissful agony, yet still, so fitting.

Until the screaming I hear,
is not my own. It’s my reason.
She screams at me,
and dives under,
grasping at my hand.

I let her down. I let go and slip through her grasp, and she rises to the surface again. She is better off without me. She doesn’t give up though. She dives under.

I scream at her, filling my lungs with more burning water, “NO! You can’t sw-” I black out. She grabs my coat and pulls it off. It sinks, but freed from the weight, we begin to rise.

Panicking she swims toward the shore. She drags my lifeless body onto the sand. Screaming yelling, begging, hitting my chest. But I don’t wake up. She screams my name.

Crying, she lies down beside me on the sand. “I-I...I was too late…” She hears coughing, spluttering as I crawl to my knees, and what feels like a river flows from my throat.

I break down. Wrapping my arms around her. We sit like that for 20 minutes, just hugging, just glad that the other was here. Unsure what to say, the silence was deafening.

“No.” I stutter, my voice cracked and shaky, “You are my reason. Please. Never let me go.”