Applying for Life

[kdke]

I'm not really a poet; I've never really got into poetry, and the few times I tried were back in high school and done for humor's sake, lol.

But this was a poem I did attempt about four years ago. I forgot I had, but found it on another account I have. I didn't have a name for it then but gave it a simple one here. I thought nothing of the poem as I started to read it, but as I got further in, I realized how much it created a keyhole into my cPTSD.

*****

Sitting in a cafe,
feeling so generically chic
with my iced americano
but not really caring
about any of it.

I just wanted a job,
to send out five more applications
which happen to be
those same applications
I meant to send out
seven
days
ago and....

Yeah.

It's a struggle.
I get lost in the past,
thinking about that
one single moment,
the one that happened
for twenty-seven years.
A singular moment.
Stretched.
Thin.
Aching and
bellowing at me.
Wanting to not be, what...
simply forgotten.

Because it knows -
to be forgotten
is to not have power,
to fade away
like ashes melting
in sea water.

It's amazing,
how something so dead
can live so loudly
in my head.

[Deep Blue]

Powerful. Thanks for sharing

[Kizzie]

This really resonates kdke, thanks for sharing it.   

[woodsgnome]

It's always hard to try explaining what this journey feels like inside...and so few outside who can understand. Even so, words like these are so needed even as we wander about, still in shock, grief, and disillusionment.   

Yet we wander, seeking still to explain what...gulp...we never can. Thanks, kdke, for sharing this 'emotional presence' (as opposed to 'emotional flashback'). It's beautiful and very poignant. The title you've chosen--'Applying for Life' --is spot on, too.

Thanks again.