I think that at the beginning, Of madness I was very small. Small and lost in a paranoid world. The voices taunted me and people mocked. Oh I saw them all, all the people in the white suits. I ranged the highway lost inside myself. Reality did not seem real, it was too hard. I spent Christmas in an institution. We drank tea and we were casualties Accidents of life, a death, an illness Loneliness – the Lavender lace of solitude. I tried to reach out but there was a screen, A screen of broken images Silhouettes and Flashes, illusion, illusion, Memories and fantasies all overgrown. Dad says I get by, They have stopped putting me away, I moved and I got a little house. And I fought like a tigress To keep it together. The mind can be a terrible thing, Untethered, let free. But at last I did love myself, I did finally love myself, And I stood alone, on a great dark cliff And I called the wild dark seas I called them to my breast. I am a poet And the words fell like blood drops From a large soul. God loves me now.

This poem is from Margaret Theresa Carney's book Tales from the Womb, published in 2006 by Survivors’ Poetry. Carney was mentored by Paula Brown.

Chosen by Femi Oyebode.