A Message of Heartbreak Written on Cardboard

Something lying on the ground near a dumpster of a convenience store caught my eye as I walked through the parking lot of the assisted living center where Dad is a resident. We had just had a robust conversation about current events and I was headed toward my car.

It was 9:30 on a dry Friday morning. March 8.

I approached the curiosity and discovered a piece of cardboard roughly 18” by 18” with handwriting all over it in red and black ink. The size of the text varied.

Undoubtedly, a homeless person had written it. In recent years, I've found and read similar such pieces written on paper, plywood, sidewalks, discarded wooden furniture, a pegboard, a whiteboard and cardboard. I consider myself an expert on such literary artifacts written by homeless people and don't quite understand why I keep finding and collecting them.

The writing was not in paragraph form. There was nothing linear about its appearance. It was more of a mishmash of riffs, declarations, confessions, digressions, screeds, lamentations, perhaps a kind of written jazz or tormented anti-valentine.

I picked it up and began to read. This statement on cardboard read more like a map than prose or poetry. I read it top to bottom, side to side. This piece of writing had no beginning, middle or end, but it was lucid and contained only two typographical error (which I cleaned up). All punctuation is in the original except one added question mark where it was needed.

Below is everything I could comprehend of the writing with confidence. I could read about 80-percent of the text. What follows is not the order it appeared on the cardboard because there was no discernible order. I have arranged it in the best way I thought to have it make sense, because I desperately wanted to make sense of it.

If I die today, would anyone even notice? I doubt it. The devil will love me better.

I want to disappear and maybe they will miss me then...

I see/feel you slipping away more and more each day but you don't...

Why am I so hard to love?

Fuck love. Never again. Love kills.

Men are what's wrong with this world. “God” fucked up.

I LOST EVERYTHING BECAUSE I WANTED SOMEONE TO LOVE ME UNCONDITIONALLY, BE TRULY LOVED, JUST ONE TIME. I GUESS I'M NOT WORTHY. GOD BLESS.

I thought I had my dream guy...instead he became my nightmare.

Guess I'm meant to die alone. Why am I so easy to forget. So easy to throw away?

3-08-24

2:04 am

Wouldn't you know it? I'm here alone again. Freezing cold.

I'm worthy. I have too much love to give to the right guy.

Is love really the answer? I know it's the problem.

I just want one person to never give up on me, who loves me only, can't go days without seeing me. Scared to lose me. Fight for me. Protect me.

I think I'm the most amazing woman.

Here are a few of my thought, questions and speculations generated by reading this piece of writing:

It was written at 2:04 AM. I found it roughly seven hours later. Was it read by anyone but me? Was the message delivered to someone and then that person discarded it near the dumpster? I felt like it was displayed at the convenience store near the front entrance and then when the store opened at 8:00 AM, was taken out to the dumpster by the clerk. I surmise the man who broke this woman's heart frequented the convenience store and she figured he might see it.

This is such an impassioned cry for help, love and understanding. Why didn't the writer leave a phone number or email or something? If she had, I would have contacted her and as I write this now, have no idea what I might have said. Maybe she just needed to hear one person say he'd read the message and was moved by it.

It was written by a homeless woman. There is no other rational explanation considering the time the piece was written, what it was written on, and where I discovered it.

Did writing this message help the woman in any way? I like to think so, but that might be a writer's conceit.

Should I have taken the message and displayed it in front of the store? The clerk wouldn't see it until the end of her shift. If I did, the intended recipient might read it, as would others.

I was profoundly moved by the agony expressed in this message. And it was on cardboard.

To me, the writer didn't seem addled or delusional when writing the message. The writing is too lucid and heartfelt.

Why two different colors of ink? To me, it reveals artistic intent and sensibility. When I look at this artifact now hanging in my writing studio, it is undoubtedly a piece of art. It could also serve as the sole inspiration for a writing workshop that I would very much like to teach. Where would other writers take this artifact?