Poem: A reply to that SILENT SCREAM

-Akanksha Mahajan (Final year MBBS, GMC Amritsar)

Every year, the 10th of September is observed as World Suicide Prevention Day, as an effort to provide worldwide commitment and action to prevent suicides. The people with mental health conditions, especially, those with suicidal tendencies are often pushed down the guilt trip when they reach out with the words like- “you don’t value the life, the people who care about you”, “others have it worse”, and so much more. However, have you ever thought about the fact that what if people who feel like putting an end to their lives value all those in their lives so much that they don’t feel themselves to be worthy enough of deserving them…, maybe you would have known that if only you were a bit sensible enough to pay heed to that SILENT SCREAM.

Maybe it’s getting harder to breathe day by day,

Perhaps, it’s getting exhausting to keep looking for a way,

It must be scary to feel lost all alone,

And I’m sure you mustn’t have left a single unturned stone!

Looking for the silver lining amongst these clouds might be seeming like a distant dream,

And it’s astonishing how you managed to suppress that pain beneath that silent scream! 

That day it must have taken a great deal of strength to add voice to that pain,

But I am sorry if all those efforts to reach out were in vain.

Perhaps, it was too simple for them to push you down the guilt trip,

And you were already too tired to get a grip,

And all those worthless words,

“You don’t value life, you don’t value people who care..”

All those worthless words that kept disrupting your soul layer by layer..

You were never selfish, you were never weak,

You were just in a lot of pain to get a clear look at the entire peak.

Of course, you value life, of course, you value people who care,

Being unworthy of having it all is perhaps what you actually fear.

And yes, it’s obviously really hard to be walking all alone carrying that painful load,

But you must keep breathing and walking because you are worthy of the light that awaits you down the dusty road!