Patrick Finn, a NAMI Maryland facilitator and peer-to-peer counselor living with bipolar disorder (with psychotic features), PTSD, and a recovered eating disorder, delivers his spoken-word poem ‘My Dark Parrot’ — a visceral metaphor for intrusive trauma, suicidal ideation, and ultimately resilience — which he originally wrote during a PTSD attack.
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Transcript
[01:19:41] Oh, sorry.
[01:19:43] Luckily, I got it on my phone.
[01:19:45] Okay.
[01:19:46] Well, we don’t need your sheet.
[01:19:47] Oh, I remember.
[01:19:47] No, I remember who that is.
[01:19:48] I got it in my head.
[01:19:49] Yeah, sure you do.
[01:19:50] Thanks.
[01:19:50] I do.
[01:19:51] I do.
[01:19:51] I do.
[01:19:52] Thank you.
[01:19:53] Thank you.
[01:19:53] All right.
[01:19:54] So, coming to the stage, give it up for Patrick Finn.
[01:19:58] Give it up for him, y’all.
[01:19:59] Thank you, y’all.
[01:20:04] You guys are going to love this.
[01:20:07] Here we go.
[01:20:08] Same one.
[01:20:09] Man, he really has a way of letting it, you know, hit the floor before I do.
[01:20:13] Oh, boy.
[01:20:14] Hi, guys.
[01:20:16] So, fun little plug.
[01:20:19] So, my name is Patrick.
[01:20:20] I’m actually a facilitator at NAMI, Maryland.
[01:20:24] So, it’s an honor, an absolute honor.
[01:20:27] I’m also a peer-to-peer counselor for when we actually get that off the ground for teaching
[01:20:33] COVID mechanisms and recovery.
[01:20:34] So, that is in the mix, but hopefully that will be coming soon.
[01:20:39] And starting off, I just want to say what an honor it is.
[01:20:43] I’ve been doing this a few times, and I’m going to be boring y’all with the same poem
[01:20:46] that I do all the time.
[01:20:48] Not boring.
[01:20:49] No way.
[01:20:49] It’s not boring.
[01:20:50] It’s okay.
[01:20:51] It’s okay.
[01:20:52] I also shake a little on stage, but if you have a can of paint, I’ll shake it up for
[01:20:55] you.
[01:20:56] It’ll be great.
[01:20:56] So, you’ll be fine.
[01:20:58] I love that.
[01:20:58] So, I live myself with a, I am, I have bipolar, one with psychotic features.
[01:21:05] I live with PTSD and an overcome eating disorder as well.
[01:21:09] And this poem that I wrote, I actually wrote in the middle of a PTSD attack, which is
[01:21:15] actually, it was the first thing I could actually say I was proud of.
[01:21:19] So, I’m honored to do it for you again.
[01:21:22] So, hopefully it’s up.
[01:21:27] This is called My Dark Parrot.
[01:21:30] Did I ever tell you about my dark parrot?
[01:21:33] Well, he sits right here on my shoulder.
[01:21:36] He’s invisible, yes.
[01:21:37] But his weight resembles that.
[01:21:39] A massive boulder.
[01:21:41] He repeats things.
[01:21:42] He repeats a lot.
[01:21:44] This seemingly endless squawk riddled with realities that I thought I’d forgotten.
[01:21:51] He’s obsessed with my past.
[01:21:53] He flies into first and he leaves me laughed.
[01:21:56] He shouts my past from the finish line.
[01:21:58] But I try to run back.
[01:21:59] He flies faster than I could have sworn I was his man.
[01:22:03] But remember, he can fly.
[01:22:06] He flies as I sink.
[01:22:08] And then he returns to me.
[01:22:09] Eerily, once again, clawing open my eyes so I never get a chance to blink.
[01:22:13] To forget.
[01:22:13] No, he’s forcing me to look with no chance to read that good book.
[01:22:17] No, just forced on that hook that I took.
[01:22:21] Left to sit, wait, and marinate in a mat and a path that still leaves me shook.
[01:22:26] But then suddenly, while attached, he flies high and he brings me along.
[01:22:31] And we’re soaring happily through the clouds and the parrot convincingly exclaims that nothing can go wrong.
[01:22:37] And I believed him.
[01:22:38] That.
[01:22:39] Fucker.
[01:22:39] I believed him.
[01:22:41] He drops me.
[01:22:43] And when I fall, I fall fast.
[01:22:44] Hitting the ground so hard even my mind needs a cast.
[01:22:47] I have a dark parrot.
[01:22:49] Did I mention he’s invisible?
[01:22:51] To which, in my confusion, my mind becomes divisible.
[01:22:53] Three thoughts.
[01:22:54] Three parts.
[01:22:55] Me, myself, or that gun on my shelf.
[01:22:58] He claws in but I can’t see him.
[01:23:00] And then I pause and I stare at my wrist, wrapped in gauze, and feel the fears of so many years, of so many tears.
[01:23:07] And the memory.
[01:23:08] Of all of my loving peers, their faces are now gone, but their heads are on my lawn, each resembling my own in this constant, agonizing moan.
[01:23:18] Mine is a dark parrot.
[01:23:23] I shake, I scream, and I try to replace this nightmare with some beautiful dream.
[01:23:29] But then, out of the corner of my eye, there is an eagle that descends from the sky.
[01:23:36] And he comes down and he says,
[01:23:38] don’t cry, removing his wings, and says, with confidence, I have died, and I give these to you, for not to die, but to fly.
[01:23:51] For I am not a victim, but I am a victory.
[01:23:54] Thank you.
[01:23:55] Bye.
[01:24:08] He said the same boring poem.
[01:24:12] What?
[01:24:14] That was amazing.
[01:24:16] Please give it up for Patrick.
[01:24:17] Yes, give it up for Patrick, y’all.