There are nights when I can feel my heart cry.

When it writhes inside me, twisting and turning to reach freedom.

Clawing onto lungs and ribs as it pushes out in desperation,

because it knows there is no joy where it lies now.

 

I know I have no reason to feel this pain.

I shy away from the fact that I can’t attribute the hate.

I want to blame the boy that climbed in and broke my heart,

but that’s just too cliche, too amorous, not at all like me,

 

Three long years I spent like this, regretting living.

Regretting wanting to die and having no idea why.

 

Now, for every day I can’t come out from under the covers,

for every tear stained cheek and scar on my body,

there is a day where I drive with the sun in my face and the windows down.

Smiling from ear to ear, with just as little reason as I had before.

 

What I didn’t know then was that this feeling was called depression,

and that it doesn't always need a reason to strike you to your knees.

Now I, older, wiser, and stronger for having made it through,

say that I will stand, I will shout, I will refuse to stay on my knees.

Because even on the days I get knocked back down,

I know I will regain the strength, to belt out Bohemian Rhapsody,

guitar solos included, loud enough for all the other drivers to hear.

 

Now I have a special appreciation, and understanding of sorts,

of the parallels between joy and sadness.

That its ok to cry, but it’s never ok to forget how to laugh.

That when I thought there was no way life could be worse,

I had the strength to pull myself out and back into the sun.

 

I am proud to be more resilient than ever, with stories to tell,

of the strength I found in the scars from my heart’s great escape.

And now, even when I have reason to hang my head in submission,

I can shoulder the setbacks, the heart breaks, the slammed doors,

because I know I just need to stand and turn and face the sun.

 

And though I remember the pain well, it is comforting to know,

that the act of remembering means the feeling is resigned to a memory,

and from that memory grew strength, and joy, and compassion.

The strength to not despair even on the days that the covers feel like lead.

 

Because to be alive is a not a curse but a blessing.

For as much as I thank those that stood by me as support,

there is nothing I love more than my ability to lift my own face to the sun.

Once I learned to stand on my own, the journey to love the rest of myself had begun.