...which led to some confusion
on my part about the question
pressing most on my mind,
"do I want to live?"
which could only be answered
at that time
with a resounding
"no."
I wanted to die
and that was it.
I couldn't bear the idea of living
in a world that could be so ugly
and malicious, where people chose to
bludgeon each other with words
as well as clubs.
I thought about how I could kill
myself, being that my preferred method,
(I wanted to blow my brains out with a handgun,
a revolver)
would be quite difficult to come by.
I looked around my house for some
pills.
There were none.
I thought about knives
but they seemed too painful,
and it occurs to me
only now
that my stove is fuelled by
natural gas.
I decided I would hang myself
in the basement. That night,
I waited until my brother was asleep,
I went downstairs into the basement,
wrote my suicide note,
(which I felt was especially full of
brevity and wit)
prepared the guitar cable,
(which was to be my noose),
and turned on Beethoven's 'Moonlight Sonata'.
I stood on my chair and said a silent prayer to myself,
I said,
"God, if you do exist, you'll give me a sign
that I shouldn't do this.
I waited for about a minute.
Nothing happened.
I wrapped the cord around my neck
and prepared to jump off.
I counted
1...
2...
3...
I stood there,
not moving,
bracing for something
that wasn't going to happen.
I tried again.
Still
I just stood there.
I thought I might alleviate some of
my fear by just seeing what it
would be like to be hanged, so I
pressed my throat down on my
makeshift noose
as hard as I could.
I started getting lightheaded.
I stopped.
I pressed my throat down once more
and started choking.
I stopped again.
For a while,
I thought dying would be the
easiest thing in the world,
but it's not.
I unwrapped the cord from my throat and stepped
off the chair.
I went upstairs
and went to sleep.
I didn't dream.
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