Michael Rosen's Sad Book

This is me being sad.

Maybe you think I'm being happy in this picture.

Really I'm being sad but pretending I'm being happy.

I'm doing that because I think people won't like me if I look sad.

Somewhere sad is very big.

It's everywhere. All over me. 

What makes me most sad is when I think about my son, Eddie.

He died.

I loved him but he died anyway.

Sometimes this makes me really angry.

I say to myself, "How dare you go and die like that? How dare he make me sad?"

He doesn't say anything, 

Because he's not here anymore. 

Sometimes I don't want to talk about it. 

Not to anyone. No one. No one at all.

I just want to think about it on my own.

Because it's mine. And no one else's. 

Sometimes I do crazy things - like crying in the shower, or shouting..

Or making noises like whooph, booph, whooph. 

Sometimes I'm sad and I don't know why.

It's just  a cloud that comes along and covers me up.

It's not because Eddie's gone.

It's just because. 

Maybe it's because things aren't like they were a few years ago.

Like my family. It's not the same as it was a few years ago. 

So there's a sad place inside me. 

I've been trying to figure out ways of being sad that don't hurt so much. Here are some of them:

I tell myself that everybody has sad stuff.

I'm not the only one. Maybe you have some too. 

Every day I try and do one thing I can be proud of. 

Then I go to bed and think very very hard about this one thing.

I tell myself that being sad isn't the same as being horrible.

I'm sad, not bad. 

Sometimes I write about sad: 

Sad is a place 

That is deep and dark

like the space

under the bed

Sad is a place

that is high and light

like the sky 

above my head

When it's deep and dark

I don't dare go there

When it's high and light 

I want to be thin air

(The last bit means that I don't want to be here.

I just want to disappear). 

Sometimes I find myself looking at things:

people in a window...

a crane and a train of people going past ...

I remember things like Eddie walking along the street

laughing, laughing and laughing. 

Us playing football saves on the sofa.

And birthdays ... I love birthdays. 

And candles... 

There must be candles...