Poetry by Naomi Acosta
Edited by Erica Leal & Katherine Llave
I lay here staring
at the person who is on
the dirty carpet floor.
I can hear them crying
silent sobs as they
lie there in pain.
They have dry streaks running
down their cheeks with
new tears forming with every
second that passes.
Their erratic breathing soon
fills the room as they mutter
sweet nothings as if trying
to convince themselves that
they are okay.
As they lay there in pain, I think,
“How pitiful.”
Their red, puffy eyes
mixed with the dark bags
are beginning to
weigh on their face.
They haven’t been
sleeping well
or feeling well,
for that matter.
Instead, they are stuck in a
moment of distress and
extreme sadness, but I can
still somehow see the
hope sparkle in their eyes.
The hope that someone, or
more like anyone,
will come to their rescue,
to save them,
to see them
or at the very least,
to comfort them.
I know that this person
will not call for help
as a means to not bother
anyone and try to keep
the pain within.
They try so hard to hide their
Discolored, invisible scars and
the soft, faded stitches,
but it is too much to bear.
As they curse the universe, I can
overhear their soft muttering about
their dreams to live a
painless, or more like
a pill-less life.
A life without the constant
body aches or the
pins and needles stabbing
their abdomen as the
aches and tenderness run
all throughout their back
with flares and fire running through
their arms as well as
spasms and soreness
along their legs,
but also the stiff and sharp
never-ending agony they
live with daily to the point that they
want to chop their limbs off because
it feels like something is killing them
from the inside that they can’t fight
off…
Unable to keep watching as this
pitiful person keeps drowning in
their sorrows, I decide to help.
Reaching out with a warm hand,
I see the person reach back–
as if finally able to accept help.
But instead of comfort I am met
with a hand cold to the touch,
smooth, smudged, and detached.
It is only when my vision focuses,
sobs becoming a distant memory,
that I finally see
I’ve been looking at a mirror
and
the pitiful person is me.
Artist Statement: “Spiral” is a poem about hitting what you believe to be rock bottom. After battling with chronic illness and bottling everything up, the speaker feels isolated in a way they never had before.