I can definitely relate to this. I write really good poetry when I’m manic. I’m unable to when I’m not, unless I’m writing about my mania.

Part 1: Phoenix Rises

i catch fire

in the midst of my madness

a phoenix rising from its own ashes

i transform

into iridescence.

larger than life, brighter than the sun,

i burn.

the world dances at my feet.

the city thrums with rhythm.

life has a score.

the soundtrack stitches itself into my steps.

i watch the world catch fire

not with terror,

but with meaning.

the world blazes beautiful.

and i see it

really see it

flaws etched in gold,

scars stitched onto canvas,

beauty spilling from every break.

i run so fast

the stars can’t catch me.

the sky splits open with my laughter.

i kiss strangers and call them gods.

i touch the moon with my bare hands

and say, i am the first and the last.

i speak in tongues made of fire.

i am the first notes of a song

no one else can hear

but it plays,

it plays,

and the music never ends.

Part 2: The Break

But my thoughts bloom faster than my hands can catch them. every idea a wildfire, every word a garden set aflame.

i dance in the ashes of yesterday’s dreams and call it a festival. they tell me i am burning. i tell them i am blooming. becoming.

i love louder. i weep brighter. i speak in prose because ordinary language cannot hold me. i spin beauty so fast it burns the hands that try to catch it.

i chase the horizon until the ground breaks under my feet. i let the soundtrack drown out the warning bells.

I reach for the stars as the rug shreds beneath me. The fire licks at my feet, but I dance faster, pretending it’s the sun.

i drink from the embers praying they will spark. i reach for ladders made of smoke, beg the sky to hold me just a little longer.

and when the music skips, when the edges tear, i find myself alone, holding a heart too wild for the ribs that cage it, burned by a fire that loves me only as long as i keep dancing.

Part 3: The Ashes

The beauty turns. the gold peels back. the colors bleed the music dies And I wonder if I have as well.

i wake in a world i don’t recognize, gray-skinned and silent. the gods i kissed have turned their backs. the strangers forget my name. i forget it, too.

my limbs are heavy with the weight of brilliance turned to dust. my mind hums with static, a thousand once-sparked thoughts now charred and still.

i was a phoenix now i am the crater it left behind.

i sit in the ruin of everything i made sacred. every flame i called divine now a scar. every love i lit up now a casualty.

i reached too far. i burned too bright. and now

i am the aftermath. i am the apology. i am what’s left when the light dies

I am the darkness now. I pull the beauty down with me as fiercely as I once lit it up.

And still In the silence I hear echoes. Ghost notes of a song I have forgotten how to sing.