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Not Like the Rest


This is a true story about a girl I knew for just a little while. It’s a genuine tragedy. She wasn’t like the rest. It also forms a kind of rant against a system that not only let down this particular girl but many others as well. Hope you like it, or are moved by it even if its too sad to enjoy.


Young, slim, pretty

Shiny black hair

In satin waves

Freshness of youth

Delicate features

Fragile like the mayfly

A shy nervous smile

Flickers briefly

She looks much like the rest

And she walks and talks

Just like the rest

She tells me her story

Reads me her poems

Glimpses a future


Inside she struggles

Stresses and worries

Insecurity, plagues her like locusts

Eating confidence, consuming spirit

An empty bottle, beached

On life’s shore

Forgotten, a lonely, abandoned lamb

To face her wolves


And she hurts

“What about me?”

“What about me?”

“How should I feel? I don’t matter”

Not like the rest


Doctors diagnose, plan intervention

Prescribe medication, a hospital bed

Nurses monitor and report

Administer the treatment

Provide some care

Nobody really listens

Nobody really knows

Or understands


So she remains

Hospitalised, medicated

Pacified, stabilised

Tranquilised, desensitised

Monitored, protected

Contained, controlled


How does she feel?

She can’t explain

Then how could she

Doped and drugged

Her feelings blanked

Smothered and flattened

And they

Can’t explain

Then how could they?

She doesn’t look ill

She carries no mark

She wears no badge

They say she’s recovered

Finished her treatment

She’s not so sure

They send her home


Parents plead

A mother knows

She’s not ready

She’s still hurting

She still needs help


Her bed’s allocated

Her budget’s spent

Her resources gone

Released, discharged

Just like the rest


Her care in the community

Her one brief day

Of freedom

They came too soon

Unwittingly created

A torment too far

On a bridge

She pauses

No samaritans

No witness

No mothers arms


She’s gone

A solitary column inch

She didn’t matter

Not like the rest



◄ Re-awoken

Different Dad ►

Comments

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Francine

Thu 5th Mar 2009 16:16

Eloquently written... I feel such empathy...

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Jeff Dawson

Thu 26th Feb 2009 19:33

Hi Seamus, very sad but great tribute - loved the lines -

Inside she struggles
Stresses and worries
Insecurity, plagues her like locusts
Eating confidence, consuming spirit

see ya soon, Jeff

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Chris Dawson

Thu 22nd Jan 2009 23:37

Very much moved by this - & identified too.
Cx

Deborah Jordan Bailey

Thu 22nd Jan 2009 23:35

I agree with Nabila. I am sorry about your friend. It’s all too easy to slip through nets with great big holes in.

<Deleted User>

Thu 22nd Jan 2009 18:09

simply beautiful...

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