Depression is an art

glenn marchand

you sit between the here-right-now and the
where a person is headed. you are aware of
something, most deliberate, affected by
proximity, triggered unknowingly. you are

churchbell music, a sealed envelope, a
supposed apple, a natural inclination. you are
lethargic, listless, an alarming picture. you
are justice and injustice, style and

exploitation, unclean, or too clean to tolerate.
a boxy creature. a sore tooth. a netlike
intensity, spiraling downward. you and i
admire this, you are colorless, color

blind, the staircase never changes, perceived
by the entire world, an episode, a florist of
opaque roots. you are personality, or the lack
thereof, a soulprint, a mind pattern, part

thrall, part depth, part uncertainty. you
irrigate the insides; a songbird at moments,
producing, like invisible hands, a perfect
paragraph, a work of art, an immortalizing

portrait: a twinkle, a mystification, a pleasure
to sip with. you are in most waves, the
currency of sceneries, the gates to time,
space, and sanity. you are a trip to that place,

a need for something reaching, a reason to
say—yes to marriage, love, and promise. you
are a device—connecting through
experience, to speak of you, with intimacy,

is to be received by others, the likeness of the
interior, the mind of the current, the circuit of
the immortal. you invade intuition. you sit in
genetics. you are natural and you

come by unnatural means. you make a person
languish. you impassion a person to new
heights. you utter in essence more contrition.
you are bonded to religiosity. you

flog the person, the soul, and spirit. you are
flawless awareness. you are a universal
axiom—to mention you, ears perk up. you are
the need inside for the medication, some

medicinal form, something offsetting the
intensity. an asymmetrical creature. a person
grows accustomed to you, and you change
the rules. a person can trust you are coming.

you are the hospital visit—the sad
harmony—the reality in a jar, in a slump,
waiting patiently; you never go away, you
just linger, you sit, any activity is better than

absorption activity—the reason for risqué
activity, the source of the impetuous
rendezvous, or the reason a person needs
incessant affection. you are the catalyst to

masterpieces, the hand for self-hurting, the
breeze becoming an epiphany. many have
come to live with you, to expect your
attendance. you are a state of mind, an

irregular linchpin, so sickening, and when
absent for a moment, a person is concerned.
you popped up on me as a child—we weren’t
introduced, you were just apparent

at some point. i was sitting, and new
consciousness appeared—sullen, sad, and
heavy consciousness. you appeared at such
an early age, it seemed normal to be with

you, it must have been inevitable for me. the
dahlias looked different. existential
properties were apparent. deep interests seem
to intrigue the developing artist.

affection was once beautiful. it would soon
require of me more than i could render. you
would accompany me to every function. i
grew prideful in knowing most everyone

was carrying a piece of your legacy. the
empire was vast, and the recruitment was
rapid, and becoming indifferent was a form
of self-defense—it felt natural: the way we

ignore each other, the need for total surrender
into each person, the connections filled with
debauchery. you taught me the masquerade,
to anticipate nodding as alert to

the beauty of nature, nonetheless, heaviness
was mizzling in, latches were being
unbuckled, and religiosity was giving a
reason for suffering, where tradition was

asserting the naturality of the cycle. you
would seduce by preciousness the heart of the
rose, causing scudding and flitting and
flutters; no greater need than to comfort, to

be received as to serve a greater purpose—to
love as we might, sheer depth in its needs, to
suffer so much—human connectedness has
value, a silent desperation, as holding like
existence has come to its peak.

Glenn Marchand has an M.A. in Theology from Loyola Marymount University, and recently finished his requirements in the MFA Creative Writing program at Mount Saint Mary’s University. Marchand is an African American poet, focused on writing about existential truths, topics seeming apparent, or better, life’s aphorisms. Marchand believes in connectivity, a mystic universe, and the beauty in communicating through energy. Attached are a group of poems for consideration.