Poems by Westley Penland
Good morning, and today’s edition of October Stories is poetry by Westley Penland!
Asylum: TW Suicide, Self-Harm, Mental Health.
Seeking asylum
from my skull box
Clavicle lacerations
Adventures of ligatures
a 72 hour incarceration
Of my own making.
I am a refugee
Refusing what’s inside of me
Got me locked
On hold
How long until they come for me?
I mean, come to see?
Got no one to break me free.
In this insane asylum for eternity
My roommate repeats herself externally
“You’re the devil, get away from me”
That belt didn’t hold
Left me hanging free
Instead of hanging me
And I saw the devil
He was egging me
Telling me I stoked the fire, dangerously
He was the reason my father hated me
Burned “help” into my skin
Hoping they’d start saving me
From the devil that they made of me
So, fucking ashamed of me.
Hating myself was a way to please,
Gave the devil a brain to tease
Convinced me death was the only way of breaking free
Found new ways of breaking me
Scabs scraped down both knees
Choking that you’d pray for me
You preyed on me
Degraded me
Shocked at my plots
Of my suicidal thoughts
3 times the noose dropped
And you just scoffed
Put me in a padded box
Because you saw the devil you sought
Then Gave me the devil you fought
Now I’m a refugee
Seeking out what’s left of me
72 hours is insanity
3 days is all you’re granting me
To get back a lifetime of lost sanity
Left to rot in this box
They abandon me
She repeats herself
“Green eyed devil, you're scaring me”
Lady, I’m scaring myself
Bankrupt of self wealth
Can’t even kill myself
And I want to live
I want to be free
I just want to kill this devil that’s inside of me
Detox from the drugs that are hiding me
take the blinders off that have been blinding me
An asylum seeking refugee
Live on for the world to see
Even Devils can write poetry
And the devil that I know of me
Is better than the devil I’ll never see
Without power
That devil finally let me be.
Took ten years
To be self harm free
Tax cuts for my biological economy
Focused on the God in me
Weeded out the devil gardening
Guarding my hands from idling
Thoughts no longer idealizing
Of Losing to the devil, I’m bartering
Life is not a bargaining
Nor is it a pardoning
And there will always be a part of me
So, Grateful for the spark in me
That granted asylum to this refugee
So, I’m living forever free.
Dracula’s Demise
Immortality,
stuck for eternity
In a coffin
Buried 13 feet deep
underground
No one can hear a sound
They wouldn’t save me anyways
Brave folks put me in this grave
Knowing full well
Of my cursed spell
Forever immortal
I’m starting to think that missed stake
Wasn’t a mistake
Trapped me in here with holy water
The Lion became a lamb of slaughter.
Like a dog trapped in a well
Filled with dirt
Soaked in holy water
No escape
Can I survive
From the blood of bugs?
Can I thrive
In this darkness they dug?
There is nothing for me
but immortality
A life wasted for eternity
My demise hits me
A monster is not a moral being
Mortal thoughts coming out
After being blocked for centuries
The devil sent for me
Bloodlust thurst my insanity
The village I pillaged
Is safe from me.
But will they bury my children
In the same fashion?
A crime of passion
Filling the well
With dogs and beast
Until they save their streets
And make their peace
And earn their sleep
Or will they drive stakes deep
Turning my children to dust eternally
In their killing spree.
Darkness is all I see
Stuck here forever to dwell
A punishment, a cursed spell
But to the village
They sent their devil back to hell.
All’s well, that ends well.
Bio
Westley Penland started his poetry journey 20 years ago on Livejournal.com. He recently rediscovered this blog after a ten year hiatus from writing. As a time capsule of raw teenage emotions, it opened Pandora's box and reignited a love for spoken word. The winner of the 2021 Spirit of Diversity Creative Writing Award, he is looking forward to his upcoming publications in Alien Buddha Press Zine #69 and Stormwash: Vol 2. He can be followed on TikTok @Poetry_by_wes.
