A lost love, a mad hatter and insanity inbetween | Teen Ink

A lost love, a mad hatter and insanity inbetween

July 5, 2013
By SimpleLogic BRONZE, Orangeburg, New York
SimpleLogic BRONZE, Orangeburg, New York
2 articles 0 photos 0 comments

Favorite Quote:
"I have tried in my way to be free" -Leonard Cohen


I’m a rusted old copper soul
tossed long ago to the rhythms of the sea
washed thoroughly through and swept swiftly away
lost in a uncompleted hue in a thoughtless dream

I dreamt one day I’d drift my way to you
rocking in the waves so steadily
but it was lost too when the tide came through
and I cried till there was no water left in me.

I knew you like the sunrise
a painting no one could ever capture in a frame
warming to the soul from so far away
and your eyes burned exceptionally just the same

Underground I caught a glimpse of your light
I almost mistaken for a subway’s glare
You’re immortelle perfume filled my being
when you brushed passed me and left me standing there

I can count the times my head was filled with that delight
I saw you once standing on black bubble gum floors
all the way across the express and local tracks
I admired you till you walked through that subway's door

I told strangers of our secrets
and tentatively I would listen
with unobstructed ears and a disclosed mind
to the slurred speeches of their impaired wisdom

They lacked confidence in our receptivity
and mine for myself wore through
They told me I had gone crazy
I felt as though I was just becoming a little blue

I just wanted your love and all this I’d been dreaming of
I told this to the one consoling man with a joker grin
he told me not to worry and it would be all right
as long as I listened and followed him

He picked up his hat when it fell as we ran
galloping and lunging so smooth beside me
Early autumn striped so close to the core
soon the brightness of snow had blinded me

He took me to a place where the walls were white
and the floors the same but cold
He said “step this way, it’s alright.
This is a place for the mental, sick, and old.”

He sat me down and started to find the resemblances
in the thoughts and the feelings unrecognizably shared
He made up my own stories and dismembered all little of my glory
and diagnosed symptoms that weren’t really there

The young mad hatter was lost in his self pride
shrouded in unforgiving fumes
of his own entertainment and uncaring manners
and projecting his uproared personal volume

He danced as he rolls
accepts and pays his tolls
to an early right of tomb
I had almost forgotten
about memories almost rotten
the ugly thoughts which used to consume

I’d been waiting since yesterday's noon
He’d told me he’d be done by the end of his song
The sun comes up very soon
yet he’s still happily singing, preparing
for something that’s already come and gone

He told me as he danced
that there was nothing for him to say
“With no effort there is no chance.
You can’t just waste your life away”

Foolish was I to find solace in his empty words
in his so called “heart-filled advice”
But soon enough I accepted my fate
and decided the fumes in my little room
would do and could suffice.

But my new home grew old
and the fumes settled down to a stench
I gazed longingly out to the open road
beyond the iron gate and the empty trench

I reached in my pocket for that note which I kept for you
The only thing left from the life and hope before
I realized then I needed to get beyond that iron fence
Oh, how I needed so much more..

I escaped from Rockland Psych.
right before they tore it down
I didn’t want to put up a fight
so I got myself lost in the woods on the far side of town

I ran in my mint colored scrub
away from the madness and the heat
through the fields and into the trees
where I could be invisible and discrete.

In the forest, summers fled on wings of rain
Falls flooded the wood with colors from the sun
and when my courage certainly came
I decided my time in hiding was finally done

I stumbled out of the woods and into the light
Cars were different and the fashion had changed
I realized the world had gone on without me
My hopes and dreams became rearranged

I walked into the city streets
well passed the day’s fallen light
I found that famous subway station
and on a bench there I slept through the night

I woke from a strong smell of that of which I loved
and found you standing right there next to me
your attention on the incoming train
and the child holding your hand you could not contain
and I stuttered- “How could this be?”

It’s startling to find resemblances in the looks
that are often at first unrecognizably shared
the smell of sweet perfume wafted again in my direction
the fragrance of one whom I once cared
The pain flowed through and settles behind the iris of my weary eyes
and I turned around and left you and your child standing there

I wandered up into the streets.
into heat, sifting through madness.
I went where the current took me
At travel’s end, I found myself alone on a bridge at last.

I tucked away the message I could never send
Secured it with a cork in a bottle that was once filled with wine
I couldn’t believe I was back to broke again
left with only the lies of thoughts thinking that you could one day be mine

It read-
“Please forgive me for my stupidity
(for it is despicable)
but I also understand
if it is too much to handle
and please tell me first hand
if it is also unforgivable

But I love you ...even if I fell from so far away
I love the glow in your eyes and the scent of your perfume
I’ve only seen you a few times through and through...
But I just wish to be with you everyday..”

I assaulted the wind with that bottle
and raped the river with my plea
with that stupid, despicable note
that was suppose to win your heart immediately

I somehow found myself missing that bottle
even though it had nothing left to give me
I had to follow it into the river
where it would drift us both out to the sea

To think I found love in the subway
and the longing for your sweet perfume
Floating with that bottle I found I had many regrets
in regarding to other matters rather than just you

I found that the only thing thats bad about life
is that sometimes it doesn’t get any better
You can easily forget the goals and the dreams
that you were once so determined to go after

I felt like an old man
A rusted, bent, dollar-store thumbtack
tossed by a maniac out his window into the sea
I wondered then if he would ever take me back
And love me once again exceptionally

I used to be in better conditions
I used to give it my all
If only I took that chance..
right before my fall...

I’m nothing special, snipped off and tossed away
cut off from the world like a torn fingernail
like many others before me and many others to come
unloved and forgotten by a well scented female

I floated for as long as I can remember
But it’s only now I recall my woes from before
Looking back now I absolutely hate her
for being an rude, uncaring whore

“Do you think I am wise? Or do you think I am just crazy?”
I asked when I realized I was looking up at an old friend
he sighed, grinning and picked me up off that rocky shore
It made the mad hatter happy to see me once again..


The author's comments:
This poem is the recollections of an mentally sick man looking back at his path to insanity after attempting suicide.

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