Lauren M. Hancock Poetry and Prose

Tag: creative nonfiction

  • Poem: Unhealthy: A Confession – Spoken Word and Text – 14/07/20

    Poem: Unhealthy: A Confession – Spoken Word and Text – 14/07/20

    Audio: Unhealthy
    I am appalled,
I have failed to secure or retain
a personal connection,
a fallen notion,
an untidy, needy calling.

Why does my desire to be considered,
to be seen without trigger
exist, a stifling need woven like poison ivy
around a body and mind so disheartened?

How to dispel my lofty expectations
and allow the rain
to fall upon myself,
some cleansing gratitude,
I have spoken of this before,
now again this needs to be acknowledged,
deemed as righteous self-care and to the core.

My eyelids begin to droop,
my mind has abruptly flipped its switch,
medication has settled in,
it may be time to cease this
emotional barrage,
I’m disrupted behind this blank, calm mask,
no, now is the time for my redemption,
I’ve struggled to be myself,
to not lean upon others for self-worth;
I’ve been like this for years.

Caring eternally for opinions
can be stifling and drain the life from me,
even those whom I shouldn’t care for,
shouldn’t be concerned about nor mind,
I'll secretly consider what’s on their minds,
though we may be different,
we are still from the same ilk,
members of humankind.

A collective smile,
a happy family of viewers,
then frowns and bemused looks from
some unmoved, disapproving beings,
subtle trends of purposeful silence,
I am not subtle,
I am loud, and proud, and obnoxious
or at least that’s how I portray the dramatics.

Because, this is who I am,
it is a prickly part of me,
the indelicate balance of showy
need for approval,
for acknowledgement,
with the desire to be
proud and confident and not care,
at least neediness has lessened over the years.

But what pains me most is that
I cannot stop caring,
be it due to my annoyance or curiosity,
I want to please others,
so much so that it’s unhealthy.

I could sit before a psychologist and
allow myself to be willingly
scrutinised and analysed,
but, I view no point in this,
these traits are heavily ingrained in me.

Through years and encounters of 
desperately desired equality,
having been taken for a ride
because my mind was immature,
naive,
self-esteem fragile,
I was unwitting.

Thank God I'm finally waking up.

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Image by bstad from Pixabay

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  • Poem: Truth Within the Marrow – 07/07/20

    Poem: Truth Within the Marrow – 07/07/20

    Occasionally, I struggle to find the words
to speak,
to correctly express
my sincerity,
 
because sincere is how I wholly desire
to be viewed,
and I don’t wish for any
unfair prejudice or judgement.
 
I simply wish for
the right combination,
the winning ordering that shows
everything in part
or in whole,
that which I deem as important to know,
 
because,
little use would there be
in frightening myself into insincerity,
falsified expressions and pandering a-plenty,
 
disingenuousness and bent truths are not
how I’ve been raised,
not how I’ve been brought up to be.
 
Sometimes, I am too honest
and obvious for
my own good,
 
I can frighten or perturb
even those close to me,
with revelations,
with words they’ve never
seen nor heard,
 
they’d previously not have
considered them to be part of
my reality or path.
 
A close friend
recently listened
to my
recorded words,
 
which detailed several
mental health episodes,
my path, my mindset
was so unwell,
 
and here appeared shock,
stilted confusion,
quiet concern,
 
perhaps of my candour
and thought processes
he felt mildly aghast,
of the true extent of my illness
he had become more learned.
 
Unaware these prior thoughts
were what I had experienced,
for him, they must have
truly terrified.
 
I know for me,
at the time of their awakening,
some frightened the life
from me, too.  
 
But, I have this bone
within me
which I do not
want to pick,
 
in fact, it should be
lovingly stroked,
even strummed,
gently caressed,
 
because it assists
me with the melodies
of which I live, breathe and speak,
be they lilting,
or melancholy extended elegies.
 
The truth within my marrow,
it is rich and it is potent,
I will embrace it,
I will suck it clean,
 
I have allowed the taste 
to permeate my being,
and I will allow the honesty 
to embroil,
to envelope,
to overtake me.  

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Image credit: Clipart Library.com - Wishbone   

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  • Poem: Beneath My Layers – 01/07/20

    Poem: Beneath My Layers – 01/07/20

    Sometimes,
occasionally,
I feel like I’m coming back to life.
 
When the outer layers
peel down and around me,
revealing the
scintillating softness inside.
 
So curious am I to
view and feel and touch
this part of my identity,
where I am 
completely vulnerable and wholesome
and completely, utterly me.
 
This nature of myself 
is obvious to all,
yet still some are oblivious,

they are unused to this 
type of enthrall
in which I project a 
certain quietness,

an ethereal truth that 
whispers and ebbs
and flows
amongst the undergrowth -

these moments are special,
they herald timely news.
 
The tactile response of
hand upon softness
upon treasured flesh 
upon raw skin,

surrounded by that 
delicate fog,
sensations
of seeking something 
internally,
 
I’m curious,
what does this 
softness of myself
really mean?

Am I gentle?
Does my kindness live nestled in 
the undergrowth,
behind those protective outer layers?
 
Should I keep revealing this side,
this part of me,
so vulnerable I am
to others?
 
It’s as though I’m a
lost babe in the woods,
bare and so innocent,
I smile, grin with a
single infant tooth,
 
I am away from home,
yet I am right here,
there is nothing to worry for,
be concerned about,
to fear,
because my softness
is finally here,
 
and of my strength,
such internal,
unseen strength,
I am quietly aware.  
 
Beneath the layers,
I’ve finally found myself
and I am so proud 
to be here.

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved. 
Image by Marjon Besteman-Horn from Pixabay

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  • Poem: My Morning Show – 30/06/20

    Poem: My Morning Show – 30/06/20

    Every morning is the same for me,
I rise, I pad, I create hot water that I stain 
black with bitterness,
a substance that does please.
 
I open my laptop, 
attend to the various avenues,
hoping, wishing, waiting,
for the stats to reveal certain clues.
 
Is it bad to hope for the 'views'?
Is it bad to desire more 'likes'?
As someone who creates, I feed off the sensation
that my work has some effect upon other people's lives.
 
But views without likes,
now that’s an interesting notion,
they make my heart sink slightly,
but I shan’t allow any sense of
commotion,
angst,
anguish,
or weighty rumination,
 
to permit these existence
would be unwise,
something unwarranted,
better to learn from 
whichever mistake was performed
and for my next creation
strive for something 
more appealing and perfected.
 
There is no shame in understanding
that occasionally one shall err 
and one will fail
at being the effervescent, welcoming being
that appeals to most,

but then again, some enjoyed the darker side of me,
my prior pain, the rapid rise, 
the subsequent self-imposed suffering,

they empathised with these moments,
perhaps because they proved that 
humankind can fall,
from my delicate mantelpiece
I had fled, took my leave before them all.
 
I suppose it’s better to vary what I show of myself,
a slow striptease? 
I'll undress myself to reveal not my skin, 
not my muscles, 
not my bones,
but my inner strength,
the quiet fortitude that lives within me,
to reveal the true nature of myself,
why, this is what I hope others will wish for 
and quietly desire to read. 

© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved. 
Image by Виктория Бородинова from Pixabay

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  • Poem: A Bipolar’s Addled Mind – Spoken Word and Text – 26/06/20

    Poem: A Bipolar’s Addled Mind – Spoken Word and Text – 26/06/20

    https://soundcloud.com/user-894707136/a-bipolars-addled-mind-spoken-word-poetry 
    I shriek,
my body flushed
and covered with welts,
my very first memory,
my very first malady.
 
Illness will follow me wherever I go. 

My violin's bow hairs 
tightly hug the strings,
as left-hand dexterity is a-flurry,
the fruits born of my first psychosis,
the magic of a mind wholly
scattered and broken,
possessed pieces flying in the wind.
 
My stomach is expanding!
The result of repetitive
gorging after many months
of vain, restrictive, self-imposed starvation,
 
I call him,
alerting him to fatherhood,
he rushes, so fearful,
to confirm my grand delusion of a
twin pregnancy is not real.
 
I climb these hospital walls,
but I have the ability to
meld souls and create complex magic,
 
then suddenly I am a “witch in training”,
because of my ability to improvise protective rhyme
on the spot,
I name myself the Walking Spell Book.
 
The girl who has the room
next door,
her room smells like Death,
she is always hanging about outside,
with the door ajar,
fragrance wafting through the gap.
 
She stands by her door,
menacingly, pseudo-curious,
and wanting to encounter me,
to interact,
but for what reason?
Which hard-earned skills does she
want to thieve from me?
 
At this point,
it is always about what others want
to take from me,
to misappropriate as their own.
My suspicion of others and their ill intentions
consume my being whole.
 
That scent of Death is so overpowering
that I learn to hold my breath as I pass her room,
she asks for some help with something one day,
I was not quick enough to return to my haven,
where I could be free of the patients
and keep their questions and wants away.
 
Rainy day, rainy day,
my ailing mind, please cure,
rainy day,
thunderous day,
make me right,
I need the freedom,
of this I am so sure.
 
I recall another visit:
 
Racing thoughts, grand delusions, paranoia,
I run and rush from one patient to another,
this visit I am relishing the conversations,
I have so much I want and need to say!
 
I must be a bother with my manic motormouth,
my clanging word associations,
my shameless self-promotion of
my prose and poetry,
I know I can be wholly annoying,
but goddamnit, these things are important to me!
 
I am the Queen Bee here,
I am the socialite of the day and night, 
I can warble and charm and buzz and intellectually,
flirtatiously please,
 
charismatic is what I become during the height of my disease.
 
I am purging some of my weaknesses,
my history to be seen,
but for what purpose?
To inform, to cause a reaction,
perhaps to create an empathic response,
or arouse curiosity?
 
No matter my intent,
I will have you know,
I’m doing this with an open heart,
I tap, tap, tap, my revealing words,
so you can feel closer and achieve more understanding,
 
for the more we talk about mental illness,
the more acceptance will take place,
the more open the channels of
communication will be to read and know.
 
Discussing mental health is what we must do,
where we need to start,
there are no facts or behaviours too odd or peculiar
that must be withheld with shame 
or carried by a heavy heart.
 
Allow the conversations to begin,
let us commence these,
with wide-armed embraces,
words of understanding building towards
our truths 
which we allow to be shared and perused.
 
© 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
Background music: "Frenetic", composed by myself.
Image by S. Hermann & F. Richter from Pixabay 

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  • Poem: Pins and Pulp – 06/01/20

    Poem: Pins and Pulp – 06/01/20

     I have not been outside in days,
 huddled down in my cocoon I have encased myself 
 with stinging words and florid phrases,
 distinctive patterns to my ears,
 though perhaps not to others.
  
 Alone, I sing of times of freedom, absolution, and success,
 upon reflection, these moments were 
 anything but what I felt,
 I operated without thought
 compelled by blind impulse.
  
 I travel through my memories,
 each milestone like multiple pins spearing my 
 fragile, pulpy skin,
 these lumpy layers wrapped around my form 
 trying to keep the embarrassment in.
  
 It is easy enough to pluck the obliging weapons
 to watch the paper fall clean away
 and I am bone and sinew and muscle,
 each vein carries a pulse and a motto 
 where one must squint in order to readily discern.
 
 go forth go forth
 one repeats, red and richly
  
 never look back
 you’ll meet your match
 forget the past 
 other veins bleed.
  
 Hastily I grab the loose sheets to wrap myself anew,
 a mummy living before your very eyes,
 while bloodied, I heal enough 
 to reveal subtle poignant truths.

 But there is a filter which needs to be retained,
 a breathing apparatus which saves while one's submerged -
 for some revelations can only go one way.
 
 I decide I'm fixed enough,
 at least for now, I will rest,
 there's nothing left which I would like to say. 
  
 © 2020 Lauren M. Hancock. All rights reserved.
 All images signed “LMH” 
 are copyrighted 2019-2020 by Lauren M. Hancock 
 and all rights reserved. 

 Image credit: Eva Sandoval
 mixkit.co/@evasandoval

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  • Poem: The Game of Life – 12/12/19

    Poem: The Game of Life – 12/12/19

     Pinned to the game of life,
     spin it for a consolation prize, 
     perhaps you’ll win 
     something extraordinary,
     either way, relish the 
     pillaging of history.
      
     The girl pinned on the wheel
     is there unwillingly,
     but she is there to provide smilingly,
     there is always something to 
     gain from her presence. 
      
     Around and around 
     and upside down,
     you’ll always win from her,
     the game of life, this suits her. 
      
     She’s unable to remove herself, 
     free her stiffened limbs, 
     but she is here and she is potent
     with her hidden mysteries. 
      
     She can speak of them freely,
     but why bother, 
     some would balk,
     others would make her a pariah 
      
     Best she smiles away and 
     preserves her words
     spin the wheel of life,
     there’s nothing of substance 
     which she wants to share,
     nothing special which she’d rather say
     
     Her silencing is absurd.
      
     © 2019 Lauren M. Hancock 
    also known as Alice Well. All rights reserved.

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  • Poem: Hollow Eyed – 13/10/19

    Poem: Hollow Eyed – 13/10/19

     She hides between the curtains and the window
     from nothing in particular,
     allowing herself to view the wide-eyed smiling moon
     casting its dancing light upon the dew dotted grass;
     a nightly view so familiar.
      
     The brightness is expansive in her vision
     compared to the darkened room which she calls her home,
     where upon the walls
     she sketches blackened and angry or 
     haunted hollow-eyed figures
     whom dance within her dark.
      
     She aches inside for she feels
     another’s soul-destroying pain,
     unknowing how to assist,
     to disallow this being from suffering
     their despairing depression sunken,
     their once-free heart
     their once open wide days.
      
     And knowing this other being is suffering 
     assists her to meld easily with him,
     with her distress and unknowing
     they speak well late into the nights
     of sadness and pain and hurt upon the hours,
      
     while living in this cocoon of black sombre wall faces and figures 
     and speaking of desires to once more be free,
     from the wretched pains and emotional strains this being and her speak of
     they were intertwined through their suffering.
      
     There came times of poetic injustice 
     of teenage clichés and hidden wrists,
     but they are not so commonplace with their 
     assisted wept sufferings.
      
     These were simply times where these vulnerable beings
     melded as one
     to provide support, young love and concern,
     and express their fluctuating emotions thereabouts. 
      
     For the brief moment in time
     their stars and signs aligned 
     and they were both correct for one another and dangerous to be with each other.
      
     For if the other one fell,
     the other would surely fall deeper,
     how far could one drop before reaching a void that one is not meant to visit nor seek?

    © 2019 Alice Well Art, Lauren M. Hancock also known as Alice Well. All rights reserved.


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  • Creative Nonfiction: Today’s Thoughts and Mood: A Truthful Account – 29/08/19

    Creative Nonfiction: Today’s Thoughts and Mood: A Truthful Account – 29/08/19

    I think it’s time that I write how I feel today, a truthful account, that I will put to my name. Everything seems hopeless, I feel as though I’m nothing, not worthy of anything positive, to be written down, nothing joyous or amazing. Nothing can cheer me, it seems as though today’s sharply crested waves have a purpose, a method, a direction in which they’d like to dangerously steer me, the rocky cliff seems their chosen way. My emotions overwhelm as though thick ponderous clouds, blocking any view of sunlight that could ever be discerned, to be found. A murky suppressant internally and I feel as though I’m about to break, I can’t snap myself out of this misery, I’m so miserable, why? Oh, for goodness’s sake!

    I shouldn’t need a reason to feel this way, not when I’m usually so buoyant, happy-go-lucky, on my usual positive days, where I’d listen to others, have myself listened to in return, smiles, laughter, snide witty comments, and now of myself, you’re beginning to learn. But there are some of you who don’t need to hear of the personality behind the words, my subtle gearing, my choice smile as I witness something hilarious or absurd. However, today is one of my worse days, and I haven’t experienced anything of the like in a very long while, this ill-tempered mood seems intent on hanging around, without being useful, no fun, no method or style of any visible or felt enjoyment for now let alone for a long while.

    It’s like I am sinking into a bog, a quagmire, of heavily thickened emotions that are dragging me under, and little loose arms and greedy hands are grasping at handfuls of my hair, pulling me down, pulling me towards them, over there. Where I can easily sob with my mood, enveloped in this thick, ill fitting stew, that envelopes my body, sucks it right in with ease, as though it feels like I’m decidedly yummy. That this pit, this cesspool, is filled with darkened, painful emotions, and having myself sucked in, the vast pit now sucks me dry, of anything positive or hopeful, now nothing positive is lurking. I can only sit here, arms folded, mud right to my neck, a scowl of sadness upon my face, when will my forced positive thoughts begin to start working?

    I know I am bad company to others, feeling like this, I know I am useless, so to speak, at bringing the prior happiness out from within me, I simply wish to be myself again, but how to reach that peak? Everything seems a downer, a drainer, a weight upon my shoulders, every little thing has stacked upon one another to create a mountain of heavy, immovable, impassable things. My path of least resistance is to simply remain saddened, I know that if I wanted to, I could try to forget my worries and my pains, and become, although forced, but decidedly more gladdened.

    Whatever happened to being grateful for the things in the world that are positive for us? I cannot, will not, allow myself, to think of this path, although I know that later it will be a must. Otherwise, I will remain in this bog, sinking, sinking, into my ill thoughts and paining dreams, wondering why it is me that is the one suffering, what have I done wrong, nothing! I wish to be positively seen, not viewed of as a negative being.

    So, here ends this account, of my trying day, I’m sure others are suffering far more, but I cannot make any comment without having heard of their trying times, an encouraging, loving comment I will most certainly one day throw your way. But understand that my account was simply a means to an end, a method of catharsis, a type of expulsion, I hope that you understood my ailing, and that perhaps you’ll provide me a comforting smile or thought one day, perhaps these thoughts are worth further exploring.

    © 2019 Alice Well Art, Lauren M. Hancock also known as Alice Well. All rights reserved.


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