Back, back, back.
How [bad word] far back do you go?
She wanted to make up
for all her mistakes through me.
One night there was something
in my pants, like, blood.
My mom said,
"Oh, [bad word]  Your period."
"This is where all the trouble starts."
She was right.
No number, no letters.
Just gone.

I wrote to "Seventeen" magazine.
long letter about us.
They wanted to publish it as an article,
but kept asking:
"Your dad going away - does [bad word] back? Does it have a happy ending?"
In reality it didn't, but I thought:
"What the [bad word] 

I've always helped my mother
pick up boyfriends.
The only one I never got a say in
was the one that mattered.
- My dad.

They thought I was strange,
so they made me feel like a stranger.
Throwing me into plays, spelling bees,
studying, writing, museums, concerts
and even more writing.

If only my life could be
more like the movies.
I want an angel to swoop down to me
like he does to Jimmy Stewart in "It's a
Wonderful Life" and talk me out of suicide.
 [bad word] here, baby."
He's inside of me
where no one else has been,
in my dark and secret place.

Dr. Sterling is my dealer.
Seems like everyone's doctor
is dealing this stuff now.

Sometimes it feels like
we're all living in a Prozac nation
and it's [bad word] up, but it's me

fights, anger, guilt,
Rafe, suicidal thoughts
all of that
was part of some slow recovery process.

And I see myself [bad word] this person
who does the right thing,  who says the right thing

studying, writing, museums, concerts
and even more writing.

I'm on medication,
That's the whole point, isn't it?

see how dire the situation is
everything's just being covered up
I want him not to exist.

But I can't be this person
without taking pills

I mean, let's face it...
The United States of Depression.