Truth Confessions: The Chapbook

By Merwin McCrady

Merwin McCrady has been writing poetry since he was sixteen. He has always seen poems as tools to help him cope with mental trauma and anxiety. He is now sharing his work for the first time in this new poetry collection, Truth Confessions.

Truth Confessions contains nineteen poems written about different points in Merwin’s life. His work gives you a powerful glimpse into his inner turmoil and past traumas. Through poems written in free verse, Merwin confronts a number of issues that followed him throughout his childhood and adolescence. He includes poems centered on parental abandonment, internalized homophobia, and debilitating depression. Merwin discusses the coping mechanisms, both healthy and harmful, that he used to work through these issues.

Merwin also opens up about his identity as a member of the LGBT community and the internal and external struggles he has endured. His early, tentative explorations of his sexuality blossom into empowerment. Even in his lowest moments, Merwin never loses hope. He understands the power of his words, and he hopes his poems can inspire and comfort others during their own times of crisis and confusion.

Through these themes of identity, empathy, and optimism, Merwin’s work reflects a journey still unfolding.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Merwin McCrady
• Release date: Jul 7, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463424353

Merwin McCrady

Merwin McCrady began writing poems and song lyrics at the age of sixteen. He sees his creative endeavors as a way of exploring and coping with hurt and trauma. Merwin spent his childhood in Louisiana. He has a bachelor’s degree in theater and a master’s degree in entertainment business. He is interested in entrepreneurship and seeing struggling artists reach their dreams. Truth Confessions is Merwin’s debut poetry collection. He invites you to visit his website to read more of his poetry and short stories.

Book preview

A Child’s Cry

I Talked to an Old Friend

I talked to an old friend today.

Talked about how our lives were

How there were some similarities,

Wishing things weren’t as bad as they are now.

I’m trying to make it through;

She’s struggling too.

Wishing the dark days would resolve right now—

It will all take time.

But as with her, there’s no telling.

Hopefully she’ll be alive to see me make it.

So I can help her have a better life.

I don’t want her to revisit those grey bars

Slamming on her,

Her life staying locked behind them for

Only God knows how long.

I want to see her again in a much better state

So she can see me walk across that stage

Before I leave for college.

I want her to get better,

To live a better life.

The problems dissolve into a strengthening bond

I have been wanting with her for so long.

Help her, heal her,

My mother.

The Storm Will Clear

I had heard about your past, and it sounded all right—

Some highs, some lows.

But the day I arrived was when your life started falling apart.

Your life, my life, my sister’s, your wife’s—

All of us started falling