Funny Man
So if you've been keeping up with my posts (or not, but just seen one or two things here and there), you'd know I've been trying to participate in this years #MentalHealthAwareness campaign.
This is the 'grand finale', if you will.
I'd love to hear what you thought of this!
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Someone once joked about how we human beings
Litter the streets and offer out bribes
Then return home to complain about how sad it is
That rubbish and corruption are so widespread.
Comic or tragic, I'm not sure
But I can say that that someone
Could have made a better joke-
For we are far funnier than that
After all
What other term can be used to describe
How we thump our chests with so much pride
Because we admire the indomitable human spirit
That never stops purchasing lottery tickets
Because of its belief that there’s always a shot
Yet as soon we see hear of mental illness
We write the situation off as 'lost'?
What other explanation do we have for
How it is that everybody, big and small
Every adult and every child
Medical professional or not
Knows that the brain is an important organ
Just like the heart and liver
Yet we pretend that it's only the latter
That can ever succumb to disease?
How can we explain the panic we feel
When we hear about chemicals everywhere
Polluting our food and polluting the air-
Because we know how potent they can be-
Yet when someone says that the ones in our brains
Can cause a problem if they happen to change
That all one may need is some chemical balance
We declare that that cannot be?
Why is it that if someone unknown to us
Were to sit us down and say to us
That in this world unicorns do exist,
We would laugh them off as jokers
But if someone were to say that the real reason why
Mental sickness develops in people we know
Because the devil possesses their souls
We'd accept it without even batting an eye?
It makes no sense how we believe
In the power of germs to cause disease
These little things we don't always see
Floating about in the air
But we decide that genes and injuries
And drugs and experiences and all of life's stresses-
The things we have all felt and lived-
Cannot be the cause of mental illness
If it isn't funny then what is it
When we confidently declare
That man of today
Has made leaps and bounds in the world of science,
Yet when scientists themselves come out to announce
That through their research with fancy tech
They've found that mental illness can be cured
We think it can't be true?
What other reason can there be
For us to buy into 'creative' means
Like slimming belts and magic pills
As ways to lose excess weight,
And still we think that
It is simply ridiculous
That kind words and therapy
Can ameliorate mental disorders?
Why such selective hearing?
Why such selective believing?
Why are we able to easily console
The friend who had an untimely accident
'It wasn't in your hands, it wasn't your fault'
But refuse to accept the heart wrenching testimony
Of the four-fifty million people across the globe
When they say that they did no wrong?
How easy it is for us to get defensive
The instant we feel judged
How quick we are to simply say
'They don't know what it's like to be me'
Yet when someone claims that they aren't okay
That they experience things
We could only imagine
We sign off on their sentences?
If not funny…no, downright hilarious
What can we call it
When as mortal men
We accept that in this universe
Lie things beyond our control
Yet when someone says they are depressed
That they simply cannot 'snap out of it'
We claim that they're just not trying?
If it isn't standard practice
To slash the tires
And smash the windows
Of any old car
With a broken engine
How has it become a common response
To flag and whip and chain the man
Whose mind has broken down?
How many times have we decided
That a running nose and painful throat
Are reasons perfectly valid enough
To take a day off from work?
Then why do we struggle to understand
How it can be that when one's brain-
The centre that dictates how all else works-
Isn't operating well, then neither can they?
Hasn't it been established that it is our brains
That give us our thoughts, our actions, our beliefs?
And if a man's thoughts,
His actions and beliefs
Determine the person he is
Why can't we embrace that a single step
Taken towards attainment of mental health
Could change a man and change the world?
If funny is what we can call how we act,
We are a humorous species indeed
Because otherwise it's hard to believe
That we are capable of any real comedy:
Look left, look right, and riddle me this
Through all our 'jokes'
Of this special kind
Who, at all, is laughing?
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PC: @silent_moon756