Despair

I have had the privilege of spending time with people who have struggled with life. Some of those have felt so desperate they have contemplated suicide. Not that they wanted to die, but they felt so hopeless and despairing they contemplated suicide as a way out of their darkness. I attended a seminar recently. Suicide prevention was the focus. As I pondered suicide the following spilled out. It is raw and essentially unedited. My poetry, if that is what is called, is like singing in the shower.  It resonates with me. I imagine it will also resonate with others My heart goes out to those who find themselves feeling helpless, hopeless, and hapless. Hope? Suicide closes that door. May those who need hope, find it. Find someone you trust and share with that trusted other. Dare to reach out. Dare to be that trusted other.

Dare I not

Tattered.

Shattered.

Scattered.

Have I ever mattered?

Death where is your sting.

Bring it on!

I have longed for it.

Despair.

Life?

Hardly.

Like I was killed and not allowed to die.

Where?

What?

Whom?

Trapped!

Despair.

Yet, hanging on.

Why?

There is less?

There is more?

Even though crushed.

Still a desperation for hope.

Is it within me or beyond me?

Maybe both.

Perhaps the beyond.

Then the within.

More than synchronicity!

I hunger for it.

The pangs are potent.

Dare I hope to eat?

If only I could turn the stones of life into bread.

But bread alone is not enough.

But I crave it.

I crave drink, too.

Jesus said, “I am the bread of life”.

Jesus said, “Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst”.

Tattered.

Shattered.

Scattered.

Have I ever mattered?

Dare I risk eating?

Dare I risk drinking?

Dare I not?

Richard L. Brewer

02/05/2020