It all comes down to an email.
You're not welcome back without a letter,
explaining your illness.
You're not welcome back
without opening up your skull
and showing them how your dopamine
doesn't flow just right
and how someone stuck a sizzling
iron to all your hopes and dreams,
swirling it around until it's soup.
You cannot show them a simple sickness.
You cannot show them the path from
your mental health to physical.
Because, sweetheart, it's all in your head.
And they could care less.
Unless you figure out how to put your words  and thoughts
onto your skin like blisters or a rash
that would cover your whole body like constellations uncovering your destructive ideation.
Still they would not understand
how scary it can be to leave the bedroom
or how hard it can be to lift your head or hand.
You can't quite put your finger on it.
Your every thought a scuttling spider.
Explain to them this metaphor and what then?
Your resignation. Your death certificate.
Your only hope for a normal life imploded by a signature.
Signing off your sanity.
In the midst of your best self
you lost yourself once again
despite cutting off your ears
to ignore the whispers of desperation
that you're not okay.
You're not okay.

-Katherine Yets

Kathrine Yets teaches English composition. Her works can be found in Crabfat Magazine, Blue Heron Review, and various other literary magazines. Recent winner of the Jade Ring Award from the Wisconsin Writer's Association, she now considers herself married to her poetry.