This Day is Not the Better Time to Die
I found myself in the same place
Where
Before
I had tried to commit suicide
Now here I was again
With the same pain
This time no one would come
There is no one
To realise my intention
No one
To recognise the signs
Just me
And my thoughts
Perhaps not rational thoughts
But thoughts just the same
I do still have some grasp
On reality
I know this because
As I sit here
I am wondering
Did all those years of delay
Make any difference
Here I am
Same place
Same intention
Has anything really changed
Would it have been better
If I had succeeded
That first time and prevented
All that has occurred in between
In a moment of manic humour
I think
I am living my own Final Destination
Perhaps I am not as rational
As I thought
Which given I am sitting here
Struggling to resist suicide
Might be my only rational thought
I think about my children
And grandchildren
They would not exist
If I had died so young
Do I know if they are happy
Enough to justify
Me having created
Their existence
By living
I know now
These thoughts and plans are a
Genetically inherited tendency
To suicide and depression
Perhaps they have it too
Perhaps all I have done
Is passed the curse on
Which is all the more reason
To doubt
The value of my existence
I try to look at the past
As though I was not there
I see a black river
Running through the years
It is the nonexistence of me
The me not in School
Not married
Not working
Not knowing
Or being known by others
Not being sister aunt daughter Mother friend
The non-existent me
Leaves black holes
In history's pages
But are any of those moments
Really missed
If I had not existed
Past childhood
My children would not exist
But then logically
They would not know
Of their non-existence
But they are here
And I am glad
A glimmer of Light
In this darkness that is me
I detest my existence
Am overwhelmed
By the hatred and abuse
Of the past
That is my present
So then
Which unsuccessful attempt
Of the many
In the passing years
Would have been the better one
For success
In this procrastination of death
When would have been
The better time to die
Before marriage
After the births of children
Perhaps after the grandchildren
But there are more of those to come
Even now I cannot know
I longed so much to go
When my father died
Gone from me
The one absolute
The one unconditional
Unchanging love in my existence
It was the legacy of that love
That saved me first
That made me stay again
Stay for hurting children
Just for a little while longer
I thought
Strange how
Becoming so de- energised
By grief
Can make even death
Seem too much effort
We struggle on
Like a swimmer in the waves
Grasping for air
Tossed exhausted to the shore
Neither alive or dead
Forced back to life by another
Another's need
Another hope
A glimmer of light
Until once again
We find ourself drowning
In the despair of our existence
And the exhaustion
Of having journeyed so far
Only to return back
To that beginning so long ago
I sat in that place
For a very long time
I saw and felt myself disappearing
Into the welcoming safety
Of non being
Sensed it
Loved it
Longed for it
I journeyed once again
To the brink of that reality
And
Felt the beauty of its peace
And there I stopped and waited
No one came
No other knew my pain
But on the doorstep
Of that sweet release
I knew
I knew I could not leave
Without explanation or good bye
To do so may cause another
To knock on that same door
I have no fear of entering
And no joy in staying
But I fear
To cause the same pain
To another
That I have lived with in my life
I know my life
Has given others pain
Gives it still
The knowing
Burdens me beyond living
But does my not living
Burden another more
When non existence
Is chosen in this way
I do not know
I have no capacity for such logic
I only know
That I must stay a little longer
The pain of Being
Must be endured for now
And
Perhaps for hope
So not today
The cycle of this life turns again
I will Cry Sleep be Silent
And
Eventually
Find the will to go on
I do not know
When Death will come
Only that
This day
Is not the better time to die