The dark veil of depression covers me,blurring, obscuring
20 million people in the United States suffer from depression each year. Depression has even been called “the common cold of mental illness.” Yet only 1 person in 3 seeks treatment. And more than 30,000 Americans commit suicide annually. Given these statistics, we have much to do to educate ourselves and each other about the myths and truths of serious depression and how we heal.
Because art can often reach us and teach us in ways that purely intellectual interventions cannot, two artists who have “been there” have collaborated to create an exhibit of photographs and poems that offers hope and honors both the pain and the transforming possibility of depression.
The dark veil of depression covers me,blurring, obscuring
A prisoner inside the terribletranslucence of depression.I rage,
Shattering!Fracturing!Breaking!I’m coming apart at the seems,at the shoulds,
Stark awake on a bed of dread,I wait
I cannot come to you now.I am not who
What is the music of depression?It calls me
A seed, buried deep underground,I curl in upon
Depression, give me back my mask!Hand over that
What lies in the Shadow?What belies the light?Feeling
My body an urn of ashes and ruin,I
When I am deadened with depression,I will move
I am learning to keep my balance,putting one
Stress, I know.The question nowis where and howI
And here it begins and ends… in surrender…When
I am interested in the strange beauty of brokenness, in transforming possibility in difficult times, in how we heal even when we can’t get better, in the alchemy of surrender, in the interplay of light and shadow, in the bounty of everyday wonders, in the gift of laughter…and writing about it, all and everything.