When life begins to seem like
a song on the radio that won't stop playing -
one that you begin to resent,
When your soul whispers 'kill me'
silently and pleadingly
behind smiles and half-closed eyes,
When I can tell by the way you say
"Good, how are you?" that you are lying,
When you stop caring about outcomes,
This is darkness.

We as sufferers seek each other out,
recognized and cloaked in grey clouds.
With sympathetic smiles,
knowing gestures,
and acknowledging nods,
we coexist and coincide.

Sometimes, there are no more words
to mend the pain,
and two people are left on either side
of a chasm of mutual sorrow.
Then, there is an hour of night
when the clock strikes heartache
and our heads turn the volume up.
We are left to be the hands
holding hands holding blades.

In public, we are able
to sit together in exposed and
understood depression,
able to laugh without emptiness.
Then come the right moments,
right triggers, right words,
and we become each other's caretakers.

We are small, bright flames
in the suffocating dimness;
alone, we are matches ignited,
wondering how long is left
before we burn up and disappear.
We are trees fallen next to one another
in a forest of promising young adults
still excited to grow.

This is how we live.
This is a symbiotic relationship;
this is instinct.
Hurting people find each other
and huddle together to survive.