How Can I Be Up
how can i be up
when everything brings me down
how can i see
when there is nothing around
who was i meant to be
a lonesome drifter with nowhere to go
a strange lost mind,
expelled from the other world
the missing jigsaw piece
from a picture of a freak show
how can i be up
when the world shoots me down
how can i avoid the slide of loneliness
if there is no one around
how can i be up
when it seems i am meant to be down
how can i be up
when what i see is like,
the things that i want around
James Garratt – Wednesday 24th February 1993
More poems at
https://theboybehindtheglasses.com/
More about this blog, The Boy Behind the Glasses, here
https://theboybehindtheglasses.com/2020/01/08/the-boy-behind-the-glasses-an-introduction/
More poems from 1993 here
https://theboybehindtheglasses.com/category/poems-and-writing-1993/
How Can I Be Up – Written Wednesday 24th February 1993 (Aged 17)

I feel like “Samurai Song” by Robert Pinsky Is a nice response to this piece.
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I’ve not heard that. I will have to listen. This stuff is really early. This is thirty years ago, although I’m not as horrified by it as I thought I might be.
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It’s a poem, my teacher gave it to me my senior year of high school to keep with me for the rest of my life.
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