I wrote "Amphetamine Psalm" a year ago, in the worst stretch of my life. I had lost a job I loved at Sweet Smitty's, survived an attempt, spent time in a psychiatric hold, and gone straight from discharge into a stimulant binge. I wrote parts of it while it was still happening.
I'm sharing it now from the other side of that year. It's raw, and I've left it that way. The only question I couldn't answer then was whether the waking up was worth it. I'm still here, so I'm still working on the answer.

I left my apron on the hook at Sweet Smitty’s,
grease and laughter still on my skin,
a pizza-oven heartbeat, the rhythm of my survival.

I thought it would outlast my courage.
They called it work. I called it a pulse,
a reason to wake up,
a room where the heat made me smile
and the static in my head went quiet.
Then the shift ended.
No clock-out. No chime in my soul.

So I walled in the dark, the way I’d dared myself before:
a pill, a gun, a plan I couldn’t finish.
The world blurred, then ambulance walls, then linoleum light.
Naked before the nurses for a body check,
whispers down the hall,
then tethered to a table, strapped down for their safety.

The institution was stretch, snap, stretch.
Every eye reflected my own hollow, only softer,
wanting out, not wanting help.
Maybe they were fixed, and I am unfixable.
Less than two hours after I got out,
I was biking too fast to the car where I’d left it with the gun,
running to my dealer’s house.
My heart became a metronome.
White little crystals
promised focus,
promised fire,
promised I could outrun the insanity of the last weeks,
promised I wouldn’t cry or feel lost inside.

I don’t know the meaning of life yet,
but I know the taste of trying,
and I’m usually trying to escape it.
The sound of waking up, when you weren’t sure I would.
Maybe meaning is just being here, present where I am.

Writing this on day 6, hands trembling, amphetamine binge.
Writing this on day 9 past the gun at my temple.
Two weeks ago life was perfect. What is it now?

I had a plan, and every night I raced it toward morning.

Now I’m asking you:
what is a man
who hopes each night is the last
and wakes up anyway?