He Sits – The Tower

He Sits – The Tower
Please click on the arrow below to listen to this poem.

He Sits…
He sits in ‘the tower’.

The tower…
The tower designed ‘to protect him’.

To protect him…
To protect him ‘from others’.

From others…
From others who somehow don’t understand him or ‘don’t need him’.

Don’t need him…
Don’t need him – his anguish or ‘his torment’.

His torment…
His torment that is not only the storm without but also ‘the echoing silence within’.

The echoing silence within…
The echoing silence within that is accentuated by ‘those harrowing whispers’.

Those harrowing whispers…
Those harrowing whispers that are the thoughts and voices that flood ‘his awareness’.

His awareness…
His awareness that resonate with those whispers ‘that haunt his being’.

That haunt his being…
That haunt his being still, being sane, being at peace, ‘being whole’.

Being whole…
Being whole is not possible in this – insanity’s prison, ‘insanity’s tower’.

Insanity’s tower…
Insanity’s tower designed to protect him and yet that ‘which inevitably had imprisoned him’.

Which inevitably had imprisoned him…
Which inevitably had imprisoned him long before he knew it, understood it. long before ‘it was built’.

It was built…
It was built by the hurt, the pain, the very haunting whispers and echoes of whispers that are ‘the madness.’

The madness…
The madness that surrounds him, haunts him, imprisons him, stalks him, consumes him and in which ‘he sits’.

He sits…
He sits an unwilling prisoner and yet somehow an unwilling escapee into the ‘silent troubled isolation of his mind’.

Silent troubled isolation of his mind…
Silent troubled isolation of his mind that echoes deafeningly, accusingly, maddeningly ‘in haunting whispers’.

In haunting whispers…
In haunting whispers ‘he sits’.

He sits.

© Deep From Within/ Kevin A. Deane – May 7th. 2011

[This one is a slightly different approach to the normal style of poems that I write. I wanted to write poem which represented not only the fragmented, slightly disjointed and yet connected thoughts that my mental illness brings me but which also gave the impression of the looping nature of those thoughts.

In writing poem I seek to give no suggestion that all mental illness presents itself in this way, just to recognize and record the fact that mine does.]

He Smiles…

He smiles…
Please click on the arrow below to listen to this poem.

He smiles,
A clumsy kind of awkward smile.
But all they see,
is an indication that all is well.
So they move on.

Of course all is not well,
not well at all.
Anything but well.
But then, well,
they’ve moved on now.

He sighs.
A heavy kind of thudding sigh.
But all they hear,
is a barricade of voices.
Their voices.

Of course he exists behind that barricade.
But not their side of it.
Other than in their pious concern
their tutting, nodding,
pious concern.

He cries.
A silent kind of captive cry.
But all they hear,
is the absence of his mania.
So they are content.

But not content for him you see.
For that would cost in care.
Content within their piety.
That his mania’s not there.

They cannot see, they do not know,
the truth so deep so real.
That only in his mania,
does he ever seem to feel.

But mania’s sporadic.
Unpredictable, and free.
Uncontrollable, chaotic,
Intense duplicity.

What do they need?
Before they act.
Some gesture large and loud?
A lifeless corpse?
Remorseful note?
A hopeless telling shroud?

I will not offer that to them.
To jar them into seeing.
Seeing that, which was always there.
This hopeless, hurting being.

© Deep From Within/Kevin A. Deane 2012

[Sometimes you just need to speak that which is on your heart no matter how sad or dark that may be.

Please note that the characters represented in this poem are completely nonfictional and all names have been omitted to protect the guilty lol]

Voices of Glass

Voices of Glass

To listen to this poem please click on the arrow below.

To listen to a version of this poem which is designed to give you an idea of what goes on inside my head as a result of my paranoid schizophrenia please click on the arrow below. Please note that this version starts with about 30 seconds of simulated example of voices which can be disturbing to some.

JUST STOP SHOUTING YOUR CRUD!
SIT DOWN ! Tell me your names!
I can’t take all your noise,
All your hurts and your pains.
Can’t take all the jeering,
The tricks and the games.
You’re strange and you’re scary,
And don’t fit in my frames!

See I know who you are,
Well some of you I guess,
But together you’re noise,
you’re hurt, sorrow and stress.
And you come from a past
That I tried to leave behind
Didn’t want it to stay
in my dreams and my mind.

And they say I must try
If I want to stay sane
To listen and learn
And understand you, for gain.
To let you all live,
be free, be alive
not bury you deep
in my memories hive.

But what of my faith,
And the God that I know?
Can He love all the “me’s”
Or must one only grow?
Or am I just crazy,
Unlovable too
Alone and afraid
Behind a mask made for you.

And this mask that I wear
I didn’t choose on my own
I wear it to hide
All the pain that I’ve known
I can’t take off this mask
Be alive or be me.
It’s a permanent prison
Built just to house me.

Well not just for me
It houses you here
Keeps you hidden within
In my world full of fear.
Unless you break out
Like sometimes you do
Are you looking for love
Or did pain father you?

And what of the others
Who just meet my mask
To show them the me
Seems an impossible task
But I want to be known
For the me not for you
Not the past that I was
But the now that is true.

But you taunt me and hurt
Like I did you some wrong
When I am feeling so weak
You all seem so strong
And the pure crystal rose
All the love that I’d start
You Shattered and broke
And drove into my heart

I want to be real
To feel real and true
I want to be me
Not the “me” that holds you
For my life to make sense
Not this unending farce
I must lose all of you
My voices of glass

© Kevin A. Deane

There is a Mental Health condition known as Paranoid Schizophrenia and a condition known as either MPD or DID – (Multiple Personality Disorder or Dissociative Identity Disorder) depending on where you are or which Mental Health practitioner you speak to.

I have been diagnosed with both of these.

In essence Paranoid Schizophrenia (in the most simplistic of explanations) is where the sufferer can experience; auditory hallucinations, paranoia, bizarre delusions, altered perceptions, and disorganized speech and thoughts.

In terms of MPD or DID it does indeed have some similarities and is slightly more complicated.  It is currently believed by some that this comes where a trauma or trauma’s in your life have cause you core personality to fragment. Although I am sure many will argue that definition and indeed many do argue about it’s very existence as an illness/condition and believe it to be a misdiagnosis.

This poem is simply my ramblings on the subject.

It is my way of trying to express both what my Paranoid Schizophrenia is like and my expressing my reaction to it and/or my MPD/DID.

The Image Weaver

The Image Weaver

Excuse me sir, do you like my mask?
And the way it hangs on me?
Well I don’t care if you really don’t,
because it really isn’t me.

You think you have a weapon.
Rejection is it’s name.
You think that that’s a weapon.
I think your weapon’s tame.

Because I am the image weaver.
I weave them rather well.
I make them all realistic.
I cast them like a spell.

I can shape myself into a square,
A circle or a cube.
A slit, a slot, a triangle,
A prism or a tube.

If you reject my mask my friend.
Don’t think you’ve won the race.
For I am safe in who I am.
Because you didn’t see my face.

© Kevin A. Deane

To listen to this poem please click on the arrow below.

In life we can all too often face peer and other pressures. All too often especially as youngsters we are being forced to be what others want us to be. On top of all this, the more we suffer from rejection, a lack of self worth, a lock of confidence etc., the easier it is to put on masks in order to be what others want or expect us to be or simply to protect ourselves.

The difficulty is, and trust me it is so very sad when this happens, that sometimes we can put on so many masks and become so adept at creating and wearing them that we simply forget which face is the real us.

Labyrinth’s Battle

Labyrinth's Battle

Sitting in my memories,
My world of shattered dreams.
Reality splintered corridors,
to rooms so seldom seen.

Divided by thick walls of ice,
that are burning to the touch.
Can all my hurts be kept within?
How do they hold so much?

And then the truth befalls me.
They can’t, they burst their seams.
And flood my days with flashbacks,
My nights with twisted dreams.

The labyrinth you caused in me,
I never asked to know.
It grew in me without consent,
as my stripes of pain did grow.

You never said, “I love you son”.
or “Let me hold you safe and warm”.
Your touch was always anger led.
Your kiss was fist shaped harm.

So young the child you fragmented,
into alters big and small.
Cursing me to mental maze,
held within my ice sealed ball.

But hey! Guess what? You didn’t win!
For each of them survived.
Locked within the labyrinth,
In darkened rooms they hide.

I cannot say that I have won,
or grasped victory, it’s true.
But in all the fights I live each day,
I live to fight each day anew.

One day I know that it will end,
this battle with my past.
And through my alters I now know,
that day will be your last!

So come to me, do all you can,
in dreams and fears and pain.
For when I win the war one day,
You and I will never be the same.

© Kevin A. Deane

To listen to this poem please click on the arrow below.

I offer no explanation for this particular poem just two simple but wonderfully true statements…

If you are relating to this poem as an abuse survivor, then trust me God is a faithful true and loving Father who truly can heal the scars – even yours.

If it speaks to you as a parent who has been abusive or as someone who does or has inflicted scars on others, then trust me God is a faithful true and loving Father who truly can heal scars
– even yours.