Crack II: Obsession

“I Was a Teenager”

And then came the words.

I started writing poetry. Not for applause, not for publication — but for survival. For clarity. For the quiet rebellion of saying what couldn’t be said aloud. My notebooks became confessionals. My verses, a way to stitch together the fragments of feeling that no one else seemed to notice.

I was drawn to the English poets — not just their language, but their longing.
Keats, with his aching beauty.
Shelley, with his fire.
Shakespeare, with his mirrors and masks.
They didn’t just write — they bled. And I understood that.

I inherited this love of literature from my father — a man deeply read, quietly wise. And perhaps from my mother’s father too — a bohemian soul, a poet, a wanderer. Between them, I was gifted a lineage of language. A permission to feel deeply, to think freely.

And then there was the music.

Metal became my obsession.
Not just the sound — the scream.
All the angst I felt, all the confusion, the quiet rage, the unspoken questions — they found rhythm in distortion.
Where the world demanded silence, metal gave me voice.

Books and music became my sanctuary.
My safe haven.
My mirror — not polished, but honest.

I think my love for art, literature, philosophy, and metal music refined me.
Not into perfection, but into sensitivity.
Not into conformity, but into compassion.

I was kind.
Always.
Even when I was angry.
Even when I was misunderstood.
Even when the world felt like a place I didn’t belong to.

Because art taught me empathy.
Music taught me resilience.
And poetry taught me that even broken things can be beautiful.

This was the crack of becoming.
Not a fracture, but a flowering.
Not a wound, but a window.