Generate Voices Forum: Mental Health Poetry

At Generate Voices, we’ve decided to start working on our first campaigns this year, one of them being Better Mental Health! We’re working to raise awareness of the lack of mental health services for people with learning disabilities and autism, Generate Voices members have shared their own experiences of mental health issues being overlooked and not taken seriously before during our weekly sessions. 

One of the many ways we decided to raise awareness is through the power of story sharing, to share our own experiences through blogs, videos, poems, interviews, social media etc. 

One of our regular members, Leon, is a poet whose poetry has been published before! He wrote these two poems about mental health which he wanted to share. Frame of Mind and Mindbreak.

Frame of Mind

The path of life sometimes winds

Sometimes not always signed

We’re entwined in sticky tape

Feeling locked out at the gate. 

At times we’re fragile 

It can last for a while,

Trapped and confined  

We all endure an alarming state of mind.

It seems to prey on the soul 

A deep dark hole 

It burns like a hot lump of coal 

At times we’re fragile  

It can last for a while,

Trapped and confined  

We all endure an alarming frame of mind. 

by Leon

Mindbreak 

Troubled minds wind like a snake 

Everything blocking the lake 

Across the back like a rake 

You can’t tell what’s real or fake.

Beware of the thorns on the line 

Followed by bad omens and signs  

Through the heart a stake 

A consequence of a mindbreak.

Sometimes there’s no escape  

Trapped by self-doubt and hate. 

by Leon

If you enjoyed reading these poems and want to find out more about our mental health campaign, please do join our Generate Voices sessions to share your experiences and to speak up and be heard!