with which its crescendos supposedly meant to overpower that of the voices

it wasn’t in the silence casted,

kissing the shores, voids dissipating into sand temporarily, miraculously

and staring down the sea,

its bottomless pit staring back

was the advent of a homecoming long awaited

there was no tragedy in skin trailing with saltwater,

or in the currents’ arms rushing out,

wrapping her in a long embrace

there was no tragedy in a body sinking, following through the force into a quicksand of a vortex underwater

the tragedy wasn’t found in her lungs’ final conquest for oxygen

or in her eyelids shutting willing into surrender

there were no recaps of her best moments much less her whole life flashing through her eyes,

not even a dying wish

for drowning didn’t mean dying

-just simply coming home,

returning safely into the ocean floor

a few miles away where the gates of poseidon’s kingdom reign

or it was that, formality for a funeral years too late

she has long succumbed into the abyss

perhaps the whole time her breathing corpse

was the only thing afloat

the tragedy wasn’t found in appearing in the headlines as a teenage heartbreak turned statistic

once a lover friend daughter sister now no one, just a loss to mourn

-the tragedy was found on eyes fixated towards the ceiling, fluorescent lights staring down, mocking

whitewashed hospital walls surrounding her

and their supposed grief’s replaced by rejoicing in her wake

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I truly believe in this cause, and I find peace and community bonded enough through hardships and hormones, making our day to day way more motivating and understanding.

— art and notes by Maoi Lazaro

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the sound of daybreak, a town slowly coming alive

as you wonder if you still are

you count every breath you spend staring

at the ceiling, watching the corners collect dust

the small patches of dirt remind you of your sins

you wait for the quetiapine to wear off, as if it ever worked

the bad dreams are proof that you cannot trust

your own mind

survival, to you, is having to stay awake

Do not fight it, my mother recites

every night like a litany

she believes my soul can be salvaged

with a couple anticonvulsants and some prayers

but do miracles even work on an agnostic?

against the moonlight, your scars look like abstract work of art

everyone pretends to understand

your sleeve of shame, your greatest asset

—the best thing about you used to be your pain

Do not fight it, your ghosts tell you

recovery is a lie; the chemicals won’t kill us

try to recall the right way to pray:

oh, Saint Lamictal, help me get through tonight and flush me

with a wave of calm

dear Saint Seroquel, teach me how to forget

the horror of watching my soul’s slow decay

forgive me—

i still cannot forgive myself

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“My art is something that allows me to express myself fully without feeling guilty afterwards. In doing so, I am able to cope with strong emotions in a healthy and productive way. It also allows for ample reflection afterwards, letting me ask myself questions like ‘what else can I do to feel better, to heal’ and ‘how can I respond to the same situation if it happens again?'”

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I wish it were easy to explain to you how my mind works. When I come home from school every weekend, worn out like an old sweater, your hugs stitch me back together, one seam at a time. I hope you know how much I love every instance we sit by the balcony and talk. You know, those Friday nights, thick with humid air and your cigarette smoke and my endless chatter; those Friday nights when I can shake the exhaustion of school from my bones while you ask me about the latest medical phenomenon I learned in class. “How does the heart pump blood,” you would ask one week. “How do our eyes actually see,” you would ask during another. You tell me you enjoy watching me explain as animatedly as I can, and I love that you listen, that you understand. You see, these concepts are relatively simple to explain because they are concrete things, objective things, things you can read on a textbook and observe in another human being. I’m sorry my mental illnesses aren’t quite as easy to observe and comprehend.

Well, they are, in a way. I witness you and dad and my siblings and friends caught up in the path of a typhoon and that typhoon is me. I am a hurricane of anxious thoughts and and half-meant suicidal jokes told wryly with a joyless grin. I am the calm before the storm, pleasant and cheerful, then suddenly I am the storm, winds roaring a hundred kilometers an hour as I jump from idea to plan to plan to idea. And then the blustering winds die down until I am nothing more than a weak breeze blowing on a sunny day – except I don’t feel the warmth of the sun because here I am stuck in bed, and I don’t want to get up and I don’t want to feel anything and I don’t want to exist for now (or forever).

But please don’t be alarmed, because I promise I’ll try my best to explain what it’s like up here behind my face. To be honest, I still don’t know why I am the way I am and maybe I never will. A couple of times, during one of our more vitriolic disagreements, you asked me if this was your fault, if you had fucked me up enough. But I know – and please believe me – that this is my mind’s fault and no one else’s. Does it matter what caused my anxiety and bipolar though? I just want you to know that I try and fight and claw my way out of this godforsaken chasm I find myself in every day.

Three years ago, I sought out a psychiatrist behind your back and dad’s because I was terrified of what you would think of me. Would you still believe that I was your first baby, the child you bore and raised two decades ago? Or would you see me like how I see myself – a shadow of your daughter, a parasite thriving in the dark, afraid to live? You see, mom, this is what depression and anxiety love to tell me every chance they get. I am useless, I am worthless, I do not deserve value and love and care. I’ve grown used to this internal monologue, this tug-o-war of self-hate and self-pity. Depression and anxiety are frenemies that love to one-up each other in my head, keeping my mind trapped in a never-ending battle with itself. I imagine every outcome I could come up with, rationality be damned. I agree and disagree; I catastrophize and the anxiety grows louder. My thoughts screech like bullets ricocheting into a deafening roar and I am held captive. What were once whispers are now screams, ordering me to bottle up these feelings, to stay silent and unaffected, to don a mask with a grin so wide, no one will believe that I was unhappy. (But I was. I am. Enough to wish I dropped dead so I could finally get the peace and quiet I longed for.)

When my diagnosis of depression was changed to bipolar 2 disorder just a couple of months ago, everything clicked in my head. Something in my mind, always so foggy and noisy, gleamed like the full moon on a cloudy evening; it was enlightenment. Now I understood the highs and the lows, the excessive energy then the sluggish apathy. I welcomed hypomania to the party in my head like an old, familiar friend.

This is how bipolar works – well, for me anyway. I’m on a rollercoaster and you know I hate rollercoasters, but god, do I love that exhilaration as I speed upwards, higher and higher. Soaring over everything and everyone, I swear I can taste the clouds from up here. I like to think of hypomania as mania’s functional cousin, because these are the times when you see me at my best, sort of. I’m up and about, restless and hankering for something, anything to do. I spew out words a mile a minute because I can barely keep up with all these new and shiny ideas in my head. I am productive. I am outgoing. I am confident. And maybe I am a little too much of those, but I don’t give a shit because these are the times when I can tell my anxiety to go suck it. I am a unicorn, bathing in rainbows and sparkles, and the euphoria is addictive. Each high has its comedown and when hypomania leaves me like a harried sailor abandoning ship, I crash and I crash hard. And you know what this looks like a little too well.

Once upon a time, you told me to put all the thoughts burrowing like worms in my brains into a box. You told me to put that box away. Compartmentalize. Done. I can’t help but feel weak because I am incapable of doing that as effortlessly as you can. My brain simply doesn’t work like that. I may not be as tough as you now, with all your decades of heartaches and happiness – but I’d like to believe I’m strong enough in my own way. Battling with one’s mind every single day is no easy feat. And maybe I can even be strong enough to make you proud.

I don’t blame you. I don’t resent you. And I definitely don’t hate you. Mom, you tell me you enjoy watching me explain things, and I love that you listen, that you understand. So I hope now you understand, maybe just a little bit. Maybe we won’t completely see eye to eye on this and that’s okay. All I really want are your empathy and your patience and your acceptance. Because this is me, this is my life, and this is how my brain works.

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Onion-skinned (2017)

Anxiety has the power to turn you into a vulnerable creature. Under its claws, your wings are clipped; you walk away on tip-toes fearing your demons. You’re aware of this, but the claws are too sharp and you grow more and more frustrated with yourself — because who wants to be onion-skinned?

Ang Zahyi Tee (2017)

By its darkness I am swallowed
pale and frozen.

Today I just Want to be Struck by Lightning.(2016)
Today my mind is numb, my body in severe ennui.
Today I just want to be struck with lightning.

Down to My Last Piece (2016)

I created this image in honor of that crucial point in our life battles– including those against ourselves– in which we hold on to that last piece of strength inside us after all else have been expended.

Claustrophobic (2012)

The Power of Perspective (2011)

Sometimes, we deem the world dirty—
Only to realize, in our moments of lucidity
that we just forgot to clean our lenses.
May we live for those moments.

Hiding Place (2011)

People who suffer from depression and anxiety often cope through avoidance.  Some succumb to depressive hibernation, but some find sanctuary in solitude and art. Depression in its severe state, however, is crippling and paralyzing. So that before one reaches this state, it is crucial that the sufferer finds a safe place to hide, be it a support system or a temporary hiatus from the demands of daily existence.

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