The in between

Tonight is so quiet the silence echoes different voices

Without thinking I am reminded of the angry waves of the Atlantic Ocean trying to escape

Except they can't, the same way my thoughts can't escape my mind

I remember a time when my chest used to feel tight every night like water filled my lungs and crying was a sport

I remember when depression pronounced my name better than my own mother

I sat at edge of a rock while the waves crashed and threatened

Drowning in wine so much I wanted to make the drowning official

So fearfully stepping closer to the edge, a beautiful mess

My sadness was always like a coffee spilt on a canvas

It was aesthetic, beautiful even, I stopped feeling the pain and became it

From pain to numb to nothingness, how hard I tried to fade out of existence

who knew the devil was an artist

Without thinking, I remember a wave so big rising above me, staring back like a python before God stepped in

He said "not today my child, I've got plans for you"

So I ran, stumbling on my feet while the water tried to catch me

The very rocks that could kill me supported me

Because God said "not today."

Tonight is so quiet the silence echoes different voices

I remember when the ocean held me by the neck and pulled me away from my family

This time, sober as a judge and glad to live

I found myself surrounded by the sea

Suddenly I could no longer swim

The waves told me what to do and when to do it

What saved my life was a rock that came out of nowhere beneath the ocean

Where there was supposedly an open hole to swallow me whole

I found a rock that kept me in place and for a moment i wanted to let go but,

God said "not today my child."

Tonight is so quiet the silence echoes different voices

I remember a time I clutched my chest so tight I almost ripped it open

My heart so sore it felt like it could stop

but it never did... how disappointing

I banged my head against the wall as if it could switch off

That night, my options were sleeping pills or nausea pills

God was already ahead so he whispered right behind my fear

One by one, I cured a nausea I didnt have

15 pills could never fill the feeling of wanting to disappear

God said "not today."

Tonight is so quiet the silence echoes different voices

Because there are nights i thought would swallow me whole

but I am still here

listening instead of disappearing into them

There are too many versions of me in this body

too many nights folded into one another

like waves refusing to forget the shore they touched

And I wonder sometimes

what to call this survival

if not a story trying to become something softer

Because I have told myself “this is a testimony”

but even testimonies need proof they lived long enough to speak

So what am I now

if I am still becoming

if I am still learning how to stay

And somewhere in that question

there is her name

My Harbour, a place I can return to

Not as a rescue

not as an answer

but as a quiet place my mind once learned to rest in

Like the ocean finding still water for a moment

before it remembers it is vast again

I don’t know what space she holds now

only that memory is strange

it can feel like comfort

and distance at the same time

Tonight is so quiet the silence echoes different voices

but I am still here

not because I was saved once

but because I am still here to continue