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​East Fork:

A Journal of the Arts​​


Quinton Callihan

Parental Ignorance


Talking to my parents about my depression is like screaming into an empty Amphitheatre;

My voice echoing off of the stone pillars;

Crashing into the open air in a cacophony of empty noise.

When I tell them I'm tired because I’m sad, it seems that what they hear is more along the lines of;

“I'm tired because I'm lazy”

When I ask them to search with me to find some help, they tell me that the only help anyone can 
provide, is a small white pill that will keep me trapped inside my own mind;

I explain to them that I don't want medication, I just want someone to talk to;

And they tell me that they wish I would talk to them more;

But when I tell them my mind paints a portrait of emptiness;

Or when I tell them the voice in the back of my head tells me to put the cold metal that I am clutching to
my heart against the smooth underside of my left arm and pull, the frown;

I am shocked when they tell me that if I go outside and feel the sun on my body, the sadness will turn to
joy and the darkness that fills my soul will be replaced with the glow of the outside world;

At this point, I realize that it is better to suffer in my bed;

With the comfort of silence to fill the saddened voice that I have created;

To erase the empty feeling that has been left there by the blissful ignorance of the ones I call MOM and
DAD.

3 AM


You were the music in my soul;


The breath in my lungs;


And the calm to my inner storm.


But now that you're gone;


My soul is silent;


My lungs are empty;


And my inner storm rages with a fiery passion.