The first of May rises not just with spring’s fragile bloom but with the tremble of a war drum echoing deep within my chest. Today marks the beginning of Mental Health Awareness Month, and for those like me—those who wear their wounds beneath the skin like sacred battle paint—it is not a time for slogans or sanitized sympathy. It is a reckoning. A reflection. A reminder that we are still here.
I have walked through fire. Not metaphorical embers, but infernos—flames shaped like memories I cannot forget, voices that never quiet, and shadows that don’t wait for nightfall to come alive. My mind, a battlefield littered with wreckage: dreams soaked in blood, faces of those I couldn’t save, and the haunting rhythm of sirens that call me to scenes no human soul should witness. They still call. They just echo inward now.
I’ve never walked this path with the aid of medication. Not out of pride, but because I chose to face the monster in the mirror with nothing but ink-stained hands and the howl of poetry, the burning ember of a cigarette, and the smooth taste of hot dark roasted coffee. I became my own alchemist, transmuting darkness into words, trauma into verse. And what emerged from that crucible were the pages of Shattered Glass, Speaking to My Depression, and Shadows From the Darkness: The Story Goes On—each book a shard of me, each line a fragment of the truth I live every day.
These aren’t just collections of poems. They’re testaments. Testimonies. Proof that even when your soul feels like it’s been hollowed out by grief, even when your past replays like a horror reel behind your eyes, you can still speak. You can still write. You can still stand, bloodied and bruised, and call it a life.
But I don’t just fight for myself. I fight for those I love—for friends who might not know the depth of what I carry, but who never have to face their own storms alone. I would shoulder the world’s weight if it meant they could breathe a little easier.
That is the oath I’ve taken—not in ceremony, but in blood, sweat, and the silent vows whispered in the backs of ambulances and the quiet corners of sleepless nights. Like the patch worn by combat medics, etched with the sacred words “So Others May Live,” I have made that creed my own. I do not carry a weapon, but I carry stories. I carry weight. I carry the broken pieces others leave behind. And in that weight, I find purpose. I choose to be the steady hand in chaos, the voice that cuts through the storm, the one who walks willingly into someone else’s hell with open eyes and an open heart. I choose to be that light—not a blazing beacon, but a flickering flame that refuses to die—for the brothers and sisters I share an ambulance with, for those haunted by the same ghosts, so they might know they are not alone in the dark.
This month, in honor of that oath and this struggle, I’m putting my poetry books on sale. Because I want you to read them—not to pity me, but to see yourself. To see what survival looks like. To understand that pain has a voice, and sometimes, that voice rhymes. This isn’t the end. It never was. It is the quiet after the sirens. And that’s the name of the memoir I’m preparing to release—The Quiet After the Sirens—a raw unveiling of the path I’ve walked, the lives I’ve touched, and the cost of wearing a brave face when the world’s falling apart inside.
Mental Health Awareness Month is more than a ribbon. It’s a mirror. It’s a challenge. And it’s a promise that no matter how deep the abyss, there is always a flicker of light.
I am not the flicker.
I am the fire.
And I will keep burning so others may see.
And to those I impact on this journey, IGOTCHU.
IGY6 ALWAYS.
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