What It Is Like Being Depressed As A Man
March 22, 2021
It’s being the funny kid
Lively and laughing
Through the hallways with your friends
Unnoticed in the stream of students
Carried by the tide of the day
Laughing and working
Until you get home when you work no more
It’s taking your 4 PM nap to escape the day
Because you don’t have to laugh in your sleep
No more work to let the others know you are happy
It’s tears welled up for years that you can’t release
Not because you don’t want to, but because you cannot
Your friends wouldn’t understand
And you don’t allow yourself to either
It’s knowing you are expected to be strong
And feeling weak when you can’t be what you are expected
Knowing you have to be there for your divorced mom and little sister
But you cannot be there for yourself
Most of all it is the late nights
Strung out over the chasm of your own mind
Knowing what you are but cannot be
Sleepless but not restless
Awake but tired
Not of the night
But of the day