I’m from a land of unspoken thoughts and imaginative worlds, bordering between my sad reality and broken mind
I’m from a hectic life full of stress and worry
I’m from a hazy, dreamlike digital world where no one knows who I am
Escaping daily to my online identity, where there are no standards or expectations
Taunted by the never ending varying opinions of those around me, but never voicing my own
I’m from the hidden fire in my heart, muffled by layers of protective stone;
the fire, the spark, burning brighter than ever, but it doesn’t dare try to break free
I’m from a swarming fury of self-hate and self-doubt, constantly warping my view on reality
While dear friends find themselves, I am left behind,
wondering what it is that they have found
I’m from forgotten memories lost to the world,
happiness and contentment flash by in swirls of blinding brightness,
only to get swallowed by the infinite gloom
I’m from the hole I bury my pain in to so I don’t seem weak,
so I don’t look as fragile as I really am,
so I can survive each day with a “brave” face
I’m from a dream that was shattered long ago
A dream of a happy, normal future that I now know is impossible to achieve
For I am hopeless in this world where you need hope to survive
I’m from a dreary nightmare that doesn’t end when I awaken
I’m from a life once beautiful, but is now a worthless dark smudge;
an ugly black blur on the map
I’m from stories tucked away into the folds of my memory,
taking me away to a better world
Enchanted into fantasies and adventures I can revisit in my dreams,
only when the nightmares are at rest
Capturing my heart, cruelly letting me believe there is something better out there
Letting the fire escape through the cracks, only to have it burn out as soon as it escapes
I’m from a place where there is no room for hope
but I can certainly dream and wish,
that maybe one day, I’ll be able to shine
Dear Kayla,
I have to say, I am thoroughly impressed by this poem. I think that you captured the devastation of the past, the uncertainty of the present, and hope for the future in a beautiful representation of what it means to be human. I can’t tell you how much this poem resonated with me; today, this was something that I needed to read. It was very relatable in the sense that I think everyone feels this way once in a while, and I think that having a poem like this that I can go back and read when I need to is definitely going to be a comfort for me. So – first and foremost – I need to thank you for writing this.
Secondly, I want to compliment you on the way you structured the poem in terms of the phrase, “I’m from.” I loved the unpredictability of it because there was no pattern to when the phrase would appear; I feel that this represented the meaning of the poem perfectly. I would offer to you that you could further this stylistic choice by putting the phrase in the middle of and at the end of sentences, too.
As a constructive criticism, I would have liked to see you play with punctuation a bit more. I found that while this was thoughtfully written, there wasn’t much consideration given to how punctuation could add to the piece. While this was definitely a piece that was stylistically meant to come across in a convoluted way to reflect the chaos of the narrator, it would have been interesting to see where sentences would come to a full stop. That could have been a technique used in order to highlight certain lines and to emphasize what is and what is not certain in the speaker’s life. Furthermore, dashes could have been effective to reflect the jagged and broken state of mind, and I think that brackets would have been really cool to play with in terms of what the speaker feels they can and cannot say. In the future, I would love to see more thoughtful consideration of punctuation from you – not that this poem needs much work to be improved, seeing as it is already brilliant!
Overall, I would say that I am honored to have read this. I am grateful that I read it when I did because it was definitely one of those pieces that I think I was meant to read at a particular time. So, thank you for this poem, and keep writing! You are clearly a gifted writer, Kayla, so I am excited to go through your blog and see what other wonderful things you’ve written!
Thanks again!
Love,
Ziyana