Trying to explain your anxiety to someone who has never experienced it has got to be one of the most challenging, and difficult things to do.

Anxiety is real, and it is a day to day obstacle.

By the light of the Dark, and the gloom of the Moon
As we dance out in our sparkling silver suits
The wind whips our backs and our hooves grind the sand
As we crash with thunder upon many distant lands
We whirl and we chase, flicking droplets to your face
Avid and harsh, we would strike out at you with avarice
And yet… some days not nights, we are full of remorse
On our backs you will ride, full of fun and naivety
But those that will stray will be eaten, and never often found
And then people will say we are cruel
Are we hurt, no not us, we dance and whirl never caring
But some men say that they love us and have a bond
So under the light of the Sun we are corralled and yielding
Until weather and moon make us restless and daring
Then we come to rip down their walls and ruin their games
And forever we will wage war upon their defences

Mum is in her room on Facebook,
I am across the hall in my own room.
In our family there's a hidden rule,
When one person cries, they do it in solitude.
So on nights when I can hear her cry,
I gently sit on my bed and stare into the sky,
I wonder if she can hear me now?
Even if she did, by morning it is almost as if I hadn't.

So if a tree falls down in the forest and no one hears,
Did it really fall?
So if I cried all night in my room and everyone pretends to not notice,
Did I really cry?

I guess I didn't cry....
But my eyes sure do make me out to be a liar.

This is my Kalashnikov
fully loaded
with overkill on my mind

Lennon sung "Give Peace A Chance"
Bob Marley And The Wailers "Redemption Songs"
"A Slow Train Coming" Bob Dylan

This is my Kalashnikov
fully loaded
with overkill on my mind.

I know what its like to have your heart heave, wrack, and judder with its broken dreams
and I know what its like to sing, dance, and be free as a bird
But mostly I know what its like to be unthankful for days where hardly nothing happens at all.

Jokers and knaves are wild cards
As ever they were
What fateful houses these make
Breath-held balancing
Precarious shelters
Gamblers and wanderers
With tumbleweed roots
Clinging air instead of earth
The stuff of fools and stars
And someone's days and years
Are made only of this
This thrilling despair

Jokers and knaves and kings and queens
And some of subtler meaning
Mean nothing but paper
Numbers and trembles
Dry-mouthed mumbles
Prayers to a ruthless god
With no reason to pity fools
And a dark love of sacrifice
Yet still desperate belief
Huddled behind swollen eyes
Contradicts every probable outcome
And falls and spins

                        By Phil Roberts

Suddenly the humble
There is one eye again
Smears
Smoothly down and quick
Spaced
The silent teeth
Graveyard slabs
All scared to white
Bright full-moon night
Glaring like a naked bone
Water taps and drips
Shaped so perfectly cold
This bleakest of light
Casting long and sharp and deep
The wailing pathetic
Are silver shards of shapes
The graveyard owl screeches
This must be someone's dream

Nowhere to go
Still strong currents pull
The places of despair
Towards and away
The tonality of moods
Warming layers
Blending with the background
It's nobody's business

A sigh that trembles
Lives balancing on whims
And then a silver-grey sky
Soaring on a song
The grace of an artless child
Smiles your eyes to smiles
The crystal tumbling stream
hallucinations of diamond water
The endless beginning
Sliding on rolling moments
Changing even truth
Even truth

                By Phil Roberts

First of all, congratulations.
You are alive and able
to read these words of mine
and that in itself is no small feat.
I feel as if people these days
do not recognize
that life is a great accomplishment.
So to you I acknowledge your due credit
and I celebrate you. Cheers.
I write this at 4 am
with a tall glass of cold coffee
and the intent of convincing you
that you are not insignificant.
Think back to the history
of our own terra firma:
there have been countless species
that once roamed here,
empires have come and gone,
inventions have been made obsolete,
attacks and raids and mutinies
have littered our history.
You have survived all of it.
Think about it.
If everything in the universe didn’t happen
exactly like it already has,
then everything would be different
and maybe you wouldn’t be reading this
but you are.
You are the perfect result
of all your ancestors
surviving through the horrors
of Earth’s past.
You are an arrangement
of old stardust and new hope
and with every sunrise you see,
or every breath you take
you’ve set a new record
and I challenge you
to always
break it again.