I Believe People Misunderstand Mental Illness
The following is based on the mind of Jeriel Clark. An American Veteran with Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The video is here because the song has more of an impact than just the lyrics alone. Like the genre of music or not, PTSD affects millions of our military veterans every year in the US and is more of an issue than most realize..
[media=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbaFJiWftwk]
"Panic Room"
Lustrous lines obscured by opaque blinds -
Frozen metacarpals tap tap tap the window glass
Syncopated staccatos with the broken clock
Synchronized with my post-traumatic ticks ticks -
Talking to the space in the room that echoes back indiscernibly
To my disconnected self/self -
It’s self-consuming, what's ensuing is my undoing -
The nightly casualty of war.
And it sounds like this: War, endless war
In my endless dance with entropy
I must rescind my sentience
The sickness that I know.
Rearrange the disarray of disintegrated senses -
Puzzle pieces, spectral splinters of a soldier’s worn and tattered soul
In my endless dance with entropy
I must rescind my sentience
The sickness that I know
Machines of air looking down on us -
The beasts of dust as we grapple heel and hand,
Mud and sand, (blood red oil)
The chaff of the harvest
Converted to currencies of wealthy means
Stepping stones cut from our perforated bones
Riches are reaped beside our bodies sown just to be thrown back again
And forgotten if we stumble in
Laid inside a homeless nest,
Stuck with eager dirty needles,
Shipped to an early steeple where boxes close
Descend with grace as you defend yourself -
Both charitable and chaste.
Praise me for my valor, lay me on a crimson tower -
Justify my endless terror as my “finest hour.”
Treat me as a token to deceive the child
Whom we fatten for this scapegoat slaughter.
I learned to fight; I learned to kill;
I learned to steal; I learned that none of this is real
None of this is real
None of this is real
NONE OF THIS IS REAL
But there’s a war inside my head
Beleaguered by my breathing - choking, screaming, heaving
Time drags me back to the desert
This is war:
A child stumbles from the wreckage holding his salvation -
The trigger to cessation - to end us all
I TOOK A LIFE, THAT TAKES MINE
Every quiet moment we COLLAPSE
Have you FORSAKEN us?
All the DARKNESS comes ALIVE.
Take my hand, drag me to the VOID.
Lustrous lines obscured by opaque blinds -
Frozen metacarpals tap tap tap the window glass
Syncopated staccatos with the broken clock
Synchronized with my post-traumatic ticks ticks -
Talking to the space in the room that echoes back indiscernibly
To my disconnected self/self -
It’s self-consuming, what's ensuing is my undoing -
The nightly casualty of war.
And it sounds like this: War, endless war
In my endless dance with entropy
I must rescind my sentience
The sickness that I know.
Rearrange the disarray of disintegrated senses -
Puzzle pieces, spectral splinters of a soldier’s worn and tattered soul
In my endless dance with entropy
I must rescind my sentience
The sickness that I know
Machines of air looking down on us -
The beasts of dust as we grapple heel and hand,
Mud and sand, (blood red oil)
The chaff of the harvest
Converted to currencies of wealthy means
Stepping stones cut from our perforated bones
Riches are reaped beside our bodies sown just to be thrown back again
And forgotten if we stumble in
Laid inside a homeless nest,
Stuck with eager dirty needles,
Shipped to an early steeple where boxes close
Descend with grace as you defend yourself -
Both charitable and chaste.
Praise me for my valor, lay me on a crimson tower -
Justify my endless terror as my “finest hour.”
Treat me as a token to deceive the child
Whom we fatten for this scapegoat slaughter.
I learned to fight; I learned to kill;
I learned to steal; I learned that none of this is real
None of this is real
None of this is real
NONE OF THIS IS REAL
But there’s a war inside my head
Beleaguered by my breathing - choking, screaming, heaving
Time drags me back to the desert
This is war:
A child stumbles from the wreckage holding his salvation -
The trigger to cessation - to end us all
I TOOK A LIFE, THAT TAKES MINE
Every quiet moment we COLLAPSE
Have you FORSAKEN us?
All the DARKNESS comes ALIVE.
Take my hand, drag me to the VOID.
[media=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbaFJiWftwk]
