High school and my strange history with religion

So this comes up because I was packing my apartment recently and found an old journal with an old poem. I forget that I was really into writing poetry in high school and college. I was also into drawing, and I save a bunch of old sketchbooks. I was inspired anyway to revisit my old website and my old poetry and read what I wrote back then. I am reminded that the depression goes back many years.. and I always had strange ways of trying to cope.

So I have a weird history with religion because basically I am the only one in my family who really tried to find religion. I was baptized Episcopal.. and until I was 8 and we moved to Texas we generally went to church. My mom worked at a preschool associated with an Episcopal church. We moved and basically didn't find a church here.. we went to one that ended up advertising in its news letter classes to cure  homosexuals, and while none of us are homosexual.. this offended my brother and I enough we couldn't go back. I went through phases though of trying to read the bible and pray

Well then when I was in middle school, my mom worked at a library and started bringing me home books on Wicca.. and I decided to become Wiccan. I did it kinda half heartedly until my junior year when a bunch of stuff was going on. I was seriously depressed. Then I had a good friend who was in a car accident and spent a while in a coma.. then she was basically brain dead.. like she woke up, but she wasn't her. I decided to devote myself to the goddess Morrigan.. and to start doing blood sacrifices in the hope I could fix things. I was convinced I could fix my life.. I was convinced I could bring myself back. So I would self harm and burn tissues I used to collect the blood. I fully acknowledge this is not an accurate representation of the religion. This was my desperate attempt to fix things.

I eventually gave up on this. I got rid of my altar. I went back to Christianity and felt terribly guilty for my history with pagan beliefs. I didn't really find religion again until 2010 when I went to Remuda Ranch and devoted myself to Christ again. Then I eventually started going to church with a friend and joined a Byzantine Catholic church. Then alcoholism made getting up that early impossible... and now I believe but just don't do anything about it.

But anyway.. a poem

My Sacrifice

   

What more can you want from me?

Everyday part of me dies for you.

The blades dig into my skin

For your blood offering .

The incense burns my flesh

Smoke for consecration, for power .

All the pain your heart desires

Leaving my body tired and scarred

What more can you want from me?

It's never been enough

So the blade goes deeper .

New cuts, new burns

Cover my body with scars .

Patterns of destruction ,

Signs of my devotion .

I lay my blood on your altar

Sacrificed to earn your favor.

What more can you want from me?

Nothing will ever be enough

Except that final sacrifice

When I lay my life out on the altar

And let the blades take it all away

And the blood snuffs out the candles

The final sign of my devotion

I live for you, I die for you

What more could you ask of me?

And if anyone cares enough to look.. this is my old website with the poetry and some old artwork. This is mostly from when I was a teenager https://www.smellydog.net/beth/main.htm

One more

Carry me away

These tired fingers

Not as quick as they used to be

This old mind

Too slow to react

This weary soul

Falling to pieces

This ruined body

That can't fight back

These steadfast opinions

Resisting the tide of change

This burning hatred

Waging this war

The falling darkness

Carrying me away