ACT 1: PLUTO

(A brief story about happiness.)

She is always near, and she is always distant. At times he feels her, at times he feels her fingers slowly slipping away from his grasp. She is five planets away . She keeps drifting further from the Milky Way. The space rigorous won’t let him reach her and now there’s a great “chasm” between them. He’s falling and falling into the abyss and the vast nothing which is the void, is his dark empty life.

ACT 2: SPACE

The difference between this Danny of 2019 and the Danny of at around high school (the happiest Danny) isn’t as clear as day and night, rather it is like the case of a porpoise and a dolphin. Physically there are not many notable changes despite going through puberty, but deep inside I’m a mess, I’m rotting, and I’m dying. I gaze blankly at the night skies thinking out loud, “when will my stars align?” But the universe doesn’t have a mouth and it still chooses to “speak” in mysterious ways. I always end up in the corner of my room staring at the dark; and staring at the dark too long is making my heart cold.

ACT 3: DANNY MWENDA VS THE WORLD

(A metaphor for my life.)

A butterfly flaps its wings at some far end of the Earth, a hurricane heads in my direction, and I lay helplessly on the ground waiting for my ending. I have been wandering around my desolate world wondering when I became sad . When did I give up on life and start to be infatuated with thoughts of my own death? How did I turn out to be a lonely fuck? But I guess I should have seen it coming. All my life I’ve been a weirdo. I mean, I’m the guy that became koutaliaphobic – having the irrational fear of spoons — while still in Primary School.

I drag myself on through life with a heavy heart — each passing day my suicidal thoughts are more seductive than the last. I walk all alone in the vast wastelands but I see no end to it. All I ever see is a murder of crows, ominous red clouds up above me, and skeletons scattered throughout. And all I ever hear is menacing laughter and calls from my grave. The air is thick and malodorous. Trying to escape is futile and so I lay helplessly on the ground — alone and defeated.

ACT 4: WORTH!

“What’s my worth?” I wonder out loud staring at my ceiling, but it won’t answer me back. I love my room pitch black much like the abyss I fell into. As I stare at the ceiling for nights on end, but my mind usually drifts far away to the vast space wondering, how did the black hole suck all the happiness away from me?

“Where’s the warmth?” I ask myself. But I only find company in the ghosts and ghouls that dwell in my room.

ACT 5: WAIT!

Depression is not only a mental illness, but also a curse. Depression is a boulder which you have to push up a hill like Sisyphus when he was cursed by Zeus. All I ever want is to be young, wild and free. All I want is to be Pegasus and scream in delight atop Mount Helicon. But I have a great weight on my shoulders and I don’t know how much longer I can wait. Heaven doesn’t want me and hell is beckoning. Will my family and friends ever forgive me if I concede defeat? Will they ever understand the kind of horrors I’ve endured?

EPIPHANY:

I’m always alone, but I’m never lonely. Suicidal thoughts keep me company and death always shadows me. And so I stand here at the station alone, waiting for my train to hell.