I live in a big city.

You know, the usual…
Tall buildings, bad traffic
And dark heavy smoke in the air.

I like Saturdays because I get to read.
It reminds me of the last days with mother
As I watched her take her last breath
And that final squeeze before she left me.

This city was our fourth and final move
It’s hard making friends here.
No one waves back hello or returns your smile
Everyone seems to be doing their own thing.

On other nights, I’m out with friends
Turning up or catching up on office gossip
On most days, I enjoy being out.
Other days, Saturday couldn’t come sooner.

A lonely girl in my class asked to be my friend
She smelled like nicotine and brandy
But she was nice to me. So I said yes.
And that’s when things went wrong.

Often I think about the past with a smile
Other times, I meet it with anger.
Angry at them, but mostly at myself.
But mother always told me to forgive myself.

She took me to all the fun parties.
I got mixed with the ‘wrong’ crowd.
Mother complained about my mini-skirts,
and she still dragged me to those long sermons

I lost five years of my life.
Five. Five years I can never get back.
Five years I lost with mother.
Oh, mother. I miss her so much.

I started using heavier drugs.
Mother could smell it in my braids
But she stopped saying anything.

A day before she passed, she gave me a letter
It was one she wrote years ago, to me.
I read it for the first time, and I wept.
No one has ever loved me the way she did.

I woke up in hospital one day.
Depression had finally gripped me.
Drugs stopped being kind to me.
And all I really wanted to do was die.

She wrote about the day she found me.
I had passed out on the couch, bleeding.
I had cuts on my wrists.
And there were pink pills on the carpet.

Nurses and doctors were everywhere.
I could hear mother crying nearby.
I could feel myself crying.
I was afraid.

Everything changed after that day.
I started seeing a psychologist.
I even went to rehab.
It was only after five years that I recovered

Mother took me home a few days later.
She didn’t say anything. I’m glad she didn’t.
I did not know what to say to her.
I had failed her.

I lost myself in those dark days.
I waited so long for approval
that when I didn’t get it,
I decided the problem was with me.

People gave me odd looks in the street.
I felt like I was being watched.
Yet, I felt more alone than ever.
Every part of me wished I died that night.

Mother and I eventually reconnected.
We spoke about anything and everything

From her, I learnt self-love and forgiveness.
I found and fell inlove with myself. Everyday

The pastor told me to hold onto God.
God? I stopped believing a long time ago.
My teacher told me to hold onto my goals.
Goals? Me? I found that hilarious.

It isn’t always easy. Especially doing it alone
Mother’s passing left such a void.
But I know she’d want to see me happy
And most times, I believe I am.

“If you seek to understand the true nature of reality, look to the quantum level, where the future and the past coexist in a nebulous ever-present now.” – Justin Faerman