Some stuff turns brain chemistry into a bowl of leeches.
Sawdust that you eat with a platter of fake mints.
When you have mixed up neural slices?
They get disposed.
Neurons.
Doing jumping jacks in unison.
Brains are like billboards.
They eat your eyes.
And get torn down like mush.
My brain chemistry is mine.
Witches brew mindset.
The neurons?
Never made it back.
They got squeezed too many times.
From the minarets the call to prayer resounds
Breaking the peaceful silence of the dawn
In its undulation of fervent fanatical need
And all across the world the daily call spreads
Making non-believers at least tolerant
Of the mysterious words and haunting refrain
Lulled into acceptance as by a snake charmer
Women too now rising up
In the name of liberation
Fervently fanatical in the need
To have it their way,
From conception to abortion and infanticide
To now the freedom to filicide,
Have it their way
A brave new Burger Queen world
Without compromise or sacrifice
For the only job they were born to do.
Meanwhile the minaret keeps up its call
Loudly proclaiming to the faithful
Ignorant and deluded,
And increasingly deserving,
“Make Misogyny Great Again”.
(9/13/26)
What have you done to me
Where was the girl
That tried to climb the cliff
Despite unfavourable conditions in there.
Why did the peak broke off
When were you seen
That made me believe in flame again
Even the one my kin couldn’t .
Who are you for real
Which gave hope for ice
That it could have an identity in sea
Although it gulped me down.
I hate how easily
my heart turns a moment
into a catastrophe.
How a silence becomes abandonment,
a small disagreement becomes goodbye,
and one unanswered message
becomes proof that I was never enough.
I wish I could feel less.
Not because I don’t want to love,
but because sometimes loving
feels like standing barefoot
in the middle of broken glass.
I get angry.
I get scared.
I say things I don’t mean
because I don’t know how to say
please don’t leave me.
And then I am alone with my thoughts,
turning every word against myself,
calling myself stupid
for having a heart
that refuses to be quiet.
But maybe I am not broken.
Maybe I am simply learning
that feeling deeply
doesn’t make me impossible to love.
Maybe I can be intense
and still be gentle.
Vulnerable
and still be strong.
Maybe someday
I will stop confusing
being afraid of losing someone
with already having lost them.
And tonight,
instead of punishing myself
for feeling too much,
I will let the feeling pass.
I will stay.
I will breathe.
And I will remind myself
that one difficult moment
does not get to decide
who I am.
Anguish is made of thunder today.
Ate me up like an X-ray.
Spit me out like trash you can chew.
Is there anything brains can’t do?
If this poisonous grip could let me go.
I could be a magician, I know.
But antidotes don’t exist these days.
Everything is tied up in delays.
I think my possessions let me behind.
I think it was my old bedroom who signed.
It started when my bedroom got sick of me.
Couldn’t tie me to a tree.
No, it’s never you leaving your stuff back there.
And yeah, I snuck in delusions in my hair.
Saying sorry to some old cloud.
Boring stuff.
Like wished for rocks.
There’s a lot of years in there.
Lying in bed, but nothing.
I missed my meds that one time.
It’s like abandonment.
Or crushed up falling.
Dreaming but it’s equilibrium.
Hold your breath while ascending.
I missed my meds.
They can’t crawl over to me.
Which is the only way I would take them.
Clink.
They ask me what is race —
I say: a border drawn in skin,
a lie that learned to breathe,
A wicked seed planted from within.
It’s not blood. Blood doesn’t know color.
It’s not bone. Bone doesn’t hold grudges.
It’s a story — told so long,
so loud, so often,
we mistook the telling for the truth.
Race is a costume
A made up competition
Of existence.
HIS-Story made us wear.
Prejudice is the cousin
Of racism for they both go hand in hand.
While they prevent every color and creed from coming together and joining hands.
Some days it fits like armor,
some days it cuts like wire,
but underneath it, every time,
is just a person
asking to be free
of the box somebody else built.
So don’t ask me what race is.
Ask what it costs.
Ask who it protects.
Ask why we’re still drawing lines
on a map that was never really there.
It’s always been this way
But now it’s plain for all to see,
Crazy not only draws crazy to it
Like a moth to flame, it also is contagious,
A flame now uncontained, blowing in the wind,
Spreading to the susceptible.
Like the corruption of minors
The insanity of our time
Grows while we passively absorb
In schools and entertainment,
In daily news and inner dreams
What was never meant to be consumed,
What never intended to be contained.
9/5/26)
I feel so good.
Finally I live in a world
Where crazy is accepted
As the norm.
A mom who strangles
Her three babies
Likely will walk free
Which means it’s open season
For every psychopath
Who wants to rape and murder
Anyone they please.
After all it’s up to us
To control ourselves
But if and when we can’t,
Oh well.
I feel so good
To finally live in a world
I can relate to.
It’s almost like being free.
(9/2/26)
Foul tempest wind dost beset thy slumber,
its rain doth drain and dampen to stupor.
I rithe at thy great agony's bequest,
haunted by frightening reminiscence.
'Still the torrid pleas of thy soul!', I cry.
Thunder does naught to distill the shrill screams.
Lightning drenches me in thick vulgar sweat;
heart racing, mind pacing, fervent unrest.
'Will I e'er see a brighter morn than this?';
for foul tempest has consumed most my years.
But just then, when all seemed undone, foregone;
rain culls, clouds lift, and a rainbow now dawns.
09.02.2026
('Resist the devil, and he shall flee')
('I have set my rainbow in the clouds...')
Mental illness is like a cabbage.
It leaves leaves all around, and is edible.
Leaves you with radioactive burns.
Mental illness gambles with life.
She asks if I want coffee.
There’s cheese over there.
Threatening.
She makes me guard the cauldron.
It’s filled with liquid amber.
Shaking.
It gives you rabies.
Mental illness guards poison.
Tells you that you could make money with the poison.
And you could.
Mental illness is like a cabbage.
Tells you to make a stew with it.
Common Barbie, let’s go party…
Because you know, girls just wanna have fun.
Which today means,
Oops I’m pregnant, what’s the best way to kill it?
Oh man, I’m so bummed to be a mom,
What’s the best way
To get rid of my little ones?
Damn, here I am, biological clock ticking
Where are all the good men?
And now, alone, quickly sliding down the hill,
At least I have my cats and a fine chardonnay.
TikTok girls at least got those likes
One time long ago.
Was it worth it, was it ever something more
Than just more adolescent drama?
Maybe that’s the wrong angle
After all,
Maybe it was only
Always just about the hormones.
(8/28/26)
She is picture perfect in broken glass,
Wearing the look of a heartbroken lass,
Lilacs bloom, but she's not aware, alas!
~
Lavender life goes on, leaves her behind,
For it knows of her hopeless state of mind,
She's in a flux, a depressed black hole bind;
~
Who can rescue her from this forlorn mood?
For she seems saddened and by sorrow blued,
Shards pierced her heart, she cries in solitude;
~
Let her free her mind and bawl in silence,
Bipolar woes have given her license !!
Help her stand against strife in defiance !!
~
Be there for her when she goes through such times,
Pick up the shattered mirror shards sometimes,
Aid her as she builds from them tinkling chimes !!
©Joanna Daniel (26.08.26)
I can see her crying
at a far distance
and she drowns
in deepest sorrow
but I cannot save her
from her woe
nor dry her tears.
Though she tries
her sobs echo still
but she is like a dove
whose tears lit a spark --
And that fire
is what illuminated
her broken soul.
Note: This poem is about a loved one who struggles with depression.
They are all so very loud
so angry and so aggressive
very frustrated and unwell
For the deep pain they caused
the endless despair, the betrayals...
That's why they're all deep in h*ll
H*ll is not what Christians think
It is ultimately a state of mind
they are conditioned to dwell
So many of them like judging others
only to wonder why I tune them out
despite having many stories to tell.
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Definition | What is Mental Illness in Poetry?
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