the night the stars fell - poetry collection

truth or dare

in seventh grade i told my friend i was going to kill myself,
she didn't believe me
or maybe she didn't care.
i tried to drown myself that day, high on sleeping pills, face down in a fully drawn bath.
my mom found me passed out in the bathtub
and i told her i had fallen asleep.
she believed me .
i went to school the next day,
pretend i was fine;
my friend never knew how honest i had been the day before.
she still doesn't know what i did that night and that she was the only person who knew.

in a game of truth or dare,
she almost bragged about attempting suicide;
telling us about it with a sense of superiority like that experience somehow should humble us and our sadness.
i could feel my heart in my throat
my blood pooling in my ears
my lungs struggling to take in air
i was panicking
my world was racing
i survived
she survived
but what if the next time she succeeds.

i rushed to tell someone
breaking down in the counselors office,
never betraying my own experience but pleading for them to help her.
my friend was angry with me
because her confession in truth or dare was a lie.
it was a joke? for attention maybe?
but she blamed me for her meeting in the office,
the loss of her door,
the concern of her parents,
all the extra rules a fabricated suicide attempt caused
there would be many next times for me and i would survive them all
i haven't told anyone
what happened to me five years ago
the intense, sense of responsibility i felt for betraying my friends trust
and hoping to save her life
no one cared about saving mine
when i wanted nothing more than to save hers