“And now I know my heart is a ghost town,” from song Ghost Town by Adam Lambert
Desolation is when the heart is laden with rage,
a soft, pale September morning
when everything you have loved is flushed
down the drain,
a bemused smile, thundering heart
and burnt page
sent me running into the arms of dark origin.
Twenty-three hit me like a hammer
drove me over the edge,
I slept with danger and flirted with the idea
of death,
I knew not individuality
I knew not self
my eyes were heavy witnessing what I’d learned
and developed.
Nobody warned me youth would yield consequences,
darling
I became dawn dipped into grey twilight;
soon craving embraced my soul
and cut my hand
my heart was a ghost town, like a rose in sand.
I am known not to swear
but fuck what the hell was I thinking!
Thanks to the rebel in me recklessness had a new name,
excuse my French.
Perhaps the only way to instill humanity back was to die
a couple of times.
I am sunshine who has battled her way through the rain,
poetry my savior,
my subconscious, my one way ticket to salvation
I have come to know that strong need only
be willing,
this is my story and I am not ashamed.
Photo credits: Pinterest
For Anmol’s Prompt 🙂
Posted for Poetics @ dVerse Poets Pub
and on Poetry Pantry @ Poets United
Sanaa, your confessional is so heartfelt! I find especially beautiful the lines:
‘I became dawn dipped into grey twilight;
soon craving embraced my soul
and cut my hand
my heart was a ghost town, like a rose in sand’
and
‘I am sunshine who has battled her way through the rain,
poetry my savior,
my subconscious, my one way ticket to salvation’.
Thank you so much, Kim 😀 so glad you enjoyed it ❤️
Saanaa this is so powerful….
This: Nobody warned me youth would yield consequences,
To grow up from darkness like that. yes I would love you to swear
Thank you so much, Bjorn 😀 so good to see you ❤️
Such a strong and powerful poem, I love the raw honesty of facing that darkness and challenges of our lives. You are still very young, but with determination, you will be a strong(er) woman. Cheers!
Thank you so much, Grace 😀 so glad you liked it ❤️
Cheers! 🙂
You had me at /I became dawn dipped into gray twilight/. Your poem is strong and so very powerful. Your resolve at remaking your life view deserves the strongest of language. I applaud your journey.
Thank you so much, Glenn 😀 so good to see you ❤️
This is honest, raw, and hopeful.
Thank you so much, V.J 😀 so glad you enjoyed it ❤️
“Perhaps the only way to instill humanity back was to die
a couple of times. ” Some of us have to learn things the hard way, but what we learn, we learn well.
Definitely 🙂 thanks for stopping by, Maggie ❤️
Your poem resonated with me and the last stanza is lasting sunshine.
Thank you so much, Jade 😀 so glad you liked it ❤️
Don’t you dare ever be ashamed. Good or evil be the best that you can be. Excellent write.
Definitely 🙂 thanks for stopping by, Violet ❤️
I love your intensity in this poem. Your feelings exude throughout as you share your story. Life is what it is and we cannot turn back time. I really like your ending… and I am not ashamed. Well done.
Thank you so much, Dwight 😀 so glad you enjoyed it ❤️
Never be ashamed of the story that you have lived — your voice is so strong here and the way you bind us into this miasma of your lived experiences is plain wonderful. Death, desolation, dread are ever present but it’s beautiful to rise out of the weightlessness of your mind into the sunshine. Poetry saved me too. Thanks for this confessional verse — it indeed takes guts to put oneself out there. And you’ve done it so well. I’d recommend Plath’s Lady Lazarus if you would like to explore this theme further. 🙂
Awww gosh! ❤️ Thank you so much, Anmol 😀 so glad you liked it! ❤️
(and thank you for the lovely prompt 🙂 I will check out Plath)
“My heart was a ghost town”…best line ever, Sanaa! Glad you’re not ashamed of your story.
Thank you so much, Lynn 😀 so good to see you ❤️
Powerful and raw Sanaa. I LOVE the line-Nobody warned me youth would yield consequences,
Darling. Indeed, if only we had known, what would we change?
Thank you so much, Linda 😀 so glad you liked it ❤️
“I became dawn dipped into grey twilight;”
“Perhaps the only way to instill humanity back was to die
a couple of times. ”
Sanaa, there are so many gems here. And for you to be so honest and vulnerable with your story, I am honored that you shared this with us.
Thank you so much, Barry 😀 so good to see you ❤️
When our choices finally become our own, and the script of life is in our unsure hands to write – we all tend to go through several drafts, some more than others, until we get the write ‘right’. I really enjoyed your candidness regarding your youth. i cannot believe I survived my younger days either… but we did, and we are poets from it all… and fuck, you are a damned good one Sanaa!
Thank you so much, Rob 😀 so glad you enjoyed it ❤️
The light needs the darkness. (K)
Definitely 🙂 thanks for stopping by, Kerfe ❤️
Nice line: “sent me running into the arms of dark origin. “
Thank you so much, Frank 😀 so glad you liked it ❤️
I read this a day or two ago and had to sit with it, and still might, I think. Very powerful, hitting like a hammer, indeed. I’m glad you’re in the light.
Thank you so much, Nora 😀 so good to see you ❤️
Sanaa, I appreciate this poem so very much, as it tells something that is REAL. It is gut-wrenching, honest, open, heart-felt, and true. So many times in your poetry of the past I wondered just who you were, but in this poem I have a glimpse. Never be ashamed of your story. It is YOU, and you are a good and strong person and a fine poet who has a lot of years ahead to write poetry and to live and revise your story as you live it. It sounds like you have gone through some hard times, but you have bounced back. Life is like that. I will say that this is my favorite poem of yours ever!!
Awwww gosh! ❤️ Thank you so much, Mary 😀 so glad you liked it! ❤️
You are warm and sunny and have come through the cold grey light of the dawn – a very frank poem from you Sanaa and that makes all the difference
Thank you so much, Laura 😀 so good to see you ❤️
I agree with Mary. I love a poem that is real and lets me know who the poet is. This poem has power. I love “dawn dipped in grey twilight……..and…..I am sunshine who has battled her way through the rain.” A very real and powerful poem, Sanaa. Bravo!
Thank you so much, Sherry 😀 so glad you enjoyed it ❤️
This lines reverberated–and I couldn’t help but the see the heroic in the “dark origin.”
Thank you so much, Chrissa 😀 so glad you liked it ❤️
“I am sunshine who has battled her way through the rain,”
Keep shining sun or rain
Thanks for dropping by my sumi Sunday Sanaa
Much🌻love
Definitely 🙂 thanks for stopping by, Gillena ❤️
Much🌻love
This is a very powerful and authentic piece of writing. There is nothing like a journey into darkness to strip away all our little contrived affectations (that society began foisting upon up from the moment the doctor announced: it’s a girl) and put us in touch with who we are when we are ‘real’. Sometimes, we have to be forced to ‘get real’ – but there is nothing more glorious than coming out on the other side of that darkness – the person that we truly are.
Thank you so much, Wendy 😀 so glad you liked it ❤️
This, to me, is your best writing from what I’ve read… it has a new voice that comes across as so strong and honest. Wonderful.
Thank you so much, Rajani 😀 so glad you enjoyed it ❤️
What a brilliant piece of writing Sanaa. Whether true or not it matters not for in our writing we speak for many who have no voices. Of course we all make mistakes that is how we learn and that is how we grow. Those of us who have made mistakes do not decry others who have also done so. I love how your writing is so strong.
Thank you so much, Robin 😀 so glad you liked it ❤️
We have all at some point travelled down this path in some form and we survived to tell a tale, but what of those that didn’t?
Definitely 🙂 thanks for stopping by, Whitesnake ❤️
I am sunshine who has battled her way through the rain,
poetry my savior,
We don’t have to be defined by the past – we can start a new chapter and re-read only if we want to. We have so many choices and options…
Absolutely! ❤️ Thank you so much, Margaret 😀 so glad you liked it! ❤️
this is so raw and honest and strong.
i think the areas of grey in our modern lives are getting wider and wider, but we should never forget to look to the light.
“excuse my French”, haha! 🙂
Thank you so much, Lee San 😀 so glad you enjoyed it ❤️
Wow, I think this brilliant piece is the new best of your always wonderful poetry. It has such power and passion! Such fabulous use of metaphor! Such searing honesty! It moves at such a pace…. I too love the sureness with which you threw in ‘Pardon my French’ (at the exactly right point in exactly the right way, which tells me you didn’t really just throw it in but made it seem that way. 🙂 )
Awww gosh! ❤️ Thank you so much, Rosemary 😍 so glad you liked it! ❤️
One of my new favorites by you, Sanaa. It reads like an explosion that knows itself, that understands how to use all the destruction for better, a breaking that wholed herself and is moving forward. Hindsight is a strange creature to look at, but when the looking is being done after one understands what went wrong and why, well… after that hindsight’s face is not so much of a mess.
Thank you so much, Magaly 😀 so glad the words resonated with you ❤️