Digital Voices

Listen to Amber’s speech here 

I believe in expression through art and poetry. It can help a person come to grasp with inner feelings and emotions. Many people express their emotions through pictures and poems. Edgar Allen Poe wrote poems about the misfortunes in his life. Picasso used art as a vent for his emotions. People use art and poetry to express themselves daily. Many people write love poems to a person they admire. Some people draw morbid pictures when they feel depressed. It is a common way to relieve one’s emotions and allows someone to feel better about themselves. Both art and poetry come from within a person. I express myself through art and poetry a lot.
I was diagnosed with ADHD in third grade. The particular type of the disorder that I had could possibly cause antisocialness, and depression. The “possibly” never applied to me for I had all of the symptoms. Few people were my friends and the other kids always picked on me for being so active and thin. Even though I did well in school some of my teachers still didn’t like me, for the same reasons as the other kids. Of course, this led to depression. During this dark phase of my life I found salvation in two forms: video games and poetry. I vented my loneliness by playing complicated games that took my mind off of life. It worked, until my games ran out. Soon, poetry took the place of my games. I wrote poems that reflected the inner me, the creature within this hollowed costume. A lot of my poems were either glum or reflected my love of games or the few friends I had. Relief always accompanied a poem I wrote. I had finally moved pain off my chest and onto paper. It made my cold heart warmer, but it wasn’t enough to free me from my bindings.
Poetry helped to contain any raging emotions I had. This became very helpful. I had gotten really mad at my mom after one of my seventh grade concerts. I carved up our wood work with knives and fingernails, because I never found a true way to vent my anger. My mom reprimanded me for this, like a normal parent. Her words caused my anger to rise once more. I stormed off into my room, to write. I found myself writing a poem about the pain and anger I felt. This showed me how foolish I was. After writing this, I returned to my mom’s side, apologizing for carving everything. Deep down, I was really apologizing for the hatred I had felt in those moments of punishment.
In my hatred of cruel reality I began to daydream. Through these visions, I found an even greater salvation to me: drawing. I began to yearn to be able to draw. Once in high school, I had finally found more friends, some of which taught me how to draw. Once capable, I began to draw my daydreams. This pushed me forward, making me more confident. Whenever I was angry, corpses littered the paper or a new misfortune befell one of the people I drew. Death, war, vampiresses; all part of my anger and grief. When happy, people would be kissing or just having fun. I never connected what I drew to my emotions, until it was drawn. I would realize that I had actually been really angry, but now I was not. I could breath easier and calmer. Now I was happy once more.
Drawing, I found, could allow me to see my emotions and grasp them. There was a time I was extremely grateful for this. You see, my grandma had been dying for years, and it irritated me. She was in so much pain, but just couldn’t die. Just seeing her began to frustrate me internally. When she actually was entering death I was amazed to find myself sad and yearning. I had been prepared for this day for years, but I found myself wanting her to respond to me being in that hospital room. Though I did find myself sad, a half of me still found happiness that her pain was going to end soon. My emotions were so drastically opposite that I eventually didn’t know what to feel. I came home and drew a picture. The picture was split; half happy, half sad. Once done, I felt relief. I now understood my emotions. My body calmed and I became neutral; neither happy, nor sad, just contempt. That night my grandma was gone, and I was fine with it. Drawing that picture allowed me to finally let my grandma go. I wrote a death related poem a few days before her funeral, it was the last testament of what I felt for her.
Writing poetry helps people get their minds organized. A lot of poetry starts out as just describing what one feels, and then they erupt on that feeling. Pictures start out as what images you see in your mind; normally these pictures reflect what you feel at the time. I know I draw a lot, sometimes for fun, sometimes for expression. I also write poetry, and unless it was an assigned poem, it is expressing my emotions. I let a piece of me flow into my pictures and poems to help me see and organize my feelings. How do you express yourself?