Drowning, sputtering
Stuttering happiness
Clapping small hands
Handling chaos
Chaotic surroundings
But I feel like I'm drowning
In gratefulness
Thankfulness
Feels like I can't deserve
Any of this
I am happy
Finally

I used to think there were healthy people and sick people.
Turns out there are no healthy people at all.
Everybody's got something.
My husband sometimes can't walk. And he sometimes can't breathe. And he sometimes can't eat. And he sometimes can't speak.
What about yours?
Sometimes I can't think.
And I can't get up.
And I can't stop thinking.
And I can't sit still.
And I can't start.
And I can't stop.
And I can't hope.
And I can't forget.
And I can never remember.
And I can't live.
And I can't die.
And I can't remember why.
Sometimes I want to just blip out of existence, like I never took up space to begin with.
Sometimes.

What about you?

What about you?

Temporary, yes.
But also forever.
Forever voices in my head.
Forever arguments.

Temporary relief, yes.
But never forever.

Here I am
Sitting alone
Thinking of your little fingers
Everyone else seems to take them for granted
But I will always love the work they do
Here's to you -
Little one -
I really hope you're having fun
Please don't grow up too fast
But I cannot wait to see the things you do
Here's to you

You chunk
You little cheese
I've know you less than 3
Months
And yet I love you
You know me
You smile when I walk in
And we start talking
You're covered in drool
And I love you

you have laughed
And you have cried
While You were always watching
And You had lived
And You had died
Before we were but hatchlings
And You were here
While you were there
Always fiercely protecting
And You by you
I learn the love
That keeps me from defecting

Plans move forward
I fight to move with them
Held back by what -
But my own head
I see my children's faces
Flashes, patterns
Today is a fight for them
Knowing they're on their way
Keeps me on mine

Anxiety makes familiar faces unfamiliar. My stomach aches in church. The monster in my head turns my loved ones into monsters also. No safety net, only cement. My pastor talks of Paul escaping Damascus, being lowered down a wall in a basket. I feel that sick swaying and tense fear. I am held in sleep but must keep moving. I am kept awake but feel sleep like a strait jacket. Save me God. My life is only nothing without You.

Depression isn't what you think.
It's not slicing wrists and crying.
Not for everyone.
Sometimes it's just a heavy blanket.
You get your work done.
Mostly, anyway.
But you don't leave your room.
You don't leave your bed.
You tell your boyfriend you're going to bed early, but you sit awake for hours.
You get a watermelon from the kitchen and eat it in bed with a spoon.
Lights off, juice dripping down your face.
Watermelon used to taste good.
Sleep used to be easy.

Don't make me go back inside
Please don't make me go
I think I might throw up
They all say "just grow up"
Don't make me go inside, I beg
Don't make go inside

Just when I feel you gone -
You arrive
Just when I feel you dead -
You survive
Just when I think I'm free -
You're not far
Just when I think I'm me -
There you are

There's a little family here.
The three of us.
Perhaps a future,
Or simply just a present.
But forever a gift. This little family -
Of ours.

God -
I give you my misery.
I produce and sacrifice for you.
I pray that you return my misery -
With truth.
In my foodlessness, I will listen.

For every sleep there is a wake
And sleep may last but a wake will always come
For every darkness there is a light
And the light may be small but it cannot be blown away
In every heart there is a place
And a heart may break or stop beating but that place is always full
For every end there is a beginning
And often they will look the same, until a small voice speaks light into your heart -
And you wake up.

Anxiety is a master of tying knots. He ties my stomach up tight - so tight you can't undo it without fingernails. Or maybe scissors.
He ties up the muscles in my neck and shoulders. I feel like a puppet on a lead, tendons throbbing like guitar strings about to snap.
He ties my tongue, so I cannot speak. When I try, I make no sense. Everyone looks at me like I'm crazy and Anxiety assures me that I am.
With Anxiety comes Depression - the fat lady. She sits on me, hardly moving, only heavy. She laughs often and with each chuckle, she weighs heavier on my lungs.

It's then I realize that I am a circus. A freak show. Anxiety is my contortionist, but he uses my body instead of his own. He twists me into pretzels and tosses me to feet of a laughing audience. Depression is the fat lady and I am her stool.  And I am the ventriloquist doll, the dancing dog, the monkey with the cymbals, the lion getting whipped, the idiot getting pelted with popcorn. And the world is a laughing audience, unaware of pain, aware only of their own entertaining confusion.

And I feel sicker.

Anxiety is getting quieter, but it's not gone. I feel it in my periphery, knocking and scratching. My walls are a little stronger today, and a little stronger everyday. But there's always that unwelcome guest tapping on my door. I hear it whispering through the boards, little lies I don't quite believe but I can't quite ignore. Each day is a fight.

Depression is a little louder today. Not quite loud enough to leak but it falls like rain on my roof. My roof is a little stronger today, and a little stronger everyday. But the rain still falls heavy and cold. When I find a leak, I patch it. Trusting the patches hold longer than I do. The rain makes me feel heavy and cold. Each day is a fight.

Anxiety - tells me that it's all my fault. It fills my chest and stomach with a sick, sweet bile that I'm unable to *****. It tells me I'm sick, but never sick enough. That I deserve to be miserable because I am a liar and a sinner and a *****.

Anxiety - looks like being late for work everyday. Being constantly distracted, overworked, underperforming.  Anxiety is quiet in the room but loud in my ears. I'm frozen in sickness but I cannot stop moving.

Waking up is like drowning in cold water. The first five minutes my eyes are open, I'm operating under nothing but the instinct to survive.
But surviving makes me late for work.
No one speaks of it but I hear their voices in my head. In my heart.
The coffee keeps me moving, keeps me b sweating, keeps me from thinking of the corroding feeling in my chest for seconds at a time. I ate a lonely breakfast too quickly so I could swallow my medicine alone.
Now it's lunch time and I'm not hungry. But I eat anyway, hoping to taste a little happiness.
I don't know what better is going to feel like so I don't know if it's coming.
Maybe better is how I feel right now.
I want to cry but every time I try, I can't.
My thoughts are all I can think about.
I'm a robot, a shell -
Going through the motions of life without feeling it.
I've become a replica of myself without consciousness.
All I do is eat and work. Sometimes they feel like the same thing.
I'm late from lunch now. I want to care.
I feel a mechanism ache in my chest - the one that's meant to care, but I don't.
I think about what to tell my therapist tonight, and I remember drowning when I woke up.
Cold, throat full of water, curled up in a dry bed.
I blame myself for being sick.
I want to cry, but I can't.
My whole body is restless, sore.
I jitter yet I feel static.
Am I even here?
If I left, would it even matter?
I keep having dreams that no one can see or hear me.
I don't know if I'm dreaming anymore.

Anxiety is - picturing gore.

Anxiety is - a searing pain in your left thigh that only appears when you're at work.

Anxiety is - feeling like you're forgetting something . . . constantly. And feeling like you're behind on everything, even when all of your work is done.

Anxiety is - waking up for work and being paralyzed in bed for 45 minutes by nausea, tightness in my chest and an oncoming panic attack. Once I can move, I'm late for work, so I ask to come in late. I lay in bed, sick, scared and writing poetry - hoping for something to save me.

Anxiety has - no power over me.
Depression has - no power over me.
My voice is my own. My voice is kind.

No other voice may rule my mind.

Anxiety is - hearing your co-workers talk quietly in another room, and assume they're planning to fire you. (With no evidence whatsoever).

Depression is - telling yourself you deserve to be fired anyway.

Depression is - emptying me.

Anxiety is - drying me out.

Depression is - getting coffee and a donut before work, knowingly making yourself late, because you are just so desperate for something - anything, to make you feel even the tiniest bit happy.

Anxiety is - telling yourself that all you'll be is fat and late for work - never happy.

Depression is - locking yourself in the bathroom at work for as long as you can get away with, and laying on the floor. Praying to fall asleep and wake up anywhere else.

Anxiety is - constant throbbing disdain for everyone around you, and the inability to explain what's wrong.

Anxiety is - waiting for the car to pull up, stomach eating itself away. Every minute needs a blueprint and you twist into one big knot trying to write them all.

Anxiety is - being afraid of the stranger in your therapist's waiting room, for no other reason than that he's a man.

Anxiety is - crying until you're catatonic.

Anxiety is - rage.

Depression is - not giving a **** if your poems make sense or if anyone likes them - you just need to get the words out as they come.

Depression is - hopelessness. Sickening, dry, fat hopelessness that bores into you.

Anxiety is - being frozen to your chair, physically unable to stand, even if you wanted to.

Depression tells you to stop taking your pills, to stop eating healthy, to stop going to therapy, because none of it matters anyway and you should just quietly curl up into a ball and let yourself fall asleep forever.

Anxiety tells you to stop taking your pills, or maybe take all of them at once. To eat heathy, but eventually to stop eating altogether. To go to therapy and admit that you're just a lying **** - you're not sick, you just want attention. It tells you that you have no control and that it knows your heart better than you do.

Anxiety is - conversations in my head that aren't real.

Depression is - feeling completely alone surrounded by people.

Anxiety is - being constantly exhausted and plagued by a knot in your thigh that gets tighter with each footstep.

Anxiety is - feeling like you might have a heart attack at 19. The tightness in your chest confuses you and surrounds you.

Anxiety is - feeling like you have to *****, every minute.

Anxiety is - showing up late to work everyday, because you cannot . . . You simply cannot make yourself get out of bed. You're paralyzed.

Anxiety is -
Telling yourself that you don't deserve to take medication, because you're just being dramatic.

Telling yourself that you're faking it, and you're wasting everyone's time.

Telling yourself that you'll never get better because there's nothing wrong with you anyway.

Anxiety is a liar.

A weighted vest
A weighed chest
Chesapeake Bay
How I sway
Back and forth
Hit the ground
What a sound
I can make
Heavy heart
Heavy hands
Handsome man
Has a plan
Without me
He'd be free
I'm gonna need
Some dopamine
Here I go
What a show
Move so slow
This buffalo
Upon my chest
There is no rest
I cannot breath
I beat my breast

Goodnight

Skeletal cinnamon trees
Frosted with the breaking, grey sky
Know more love than you
And they know more life than I

Flowing as white as the snow
With the one that she loves by her side
She'll regret this day again
When she has nowhere to hide

And I'll sit and watch them freeze
And my fingers will go numb
In the coldness of their timing
Knowing I should be the one

When you found me
I was lopsided
Uneven, unloved
Over touched
You picked me up
And evened me out
When you found me
Crawling in the dirt
I finally found what I was looking for

In these dark mornings
I pray to feel your touch
Lure me back into bed
Warm hand on my back
Fingers in my hair
Lips on my arm
Praying harder than the day I die
That you were here to keep me from getting up

One day, none of this will matter.
Let's make that day today.
I think of you, not your pain.
How you make me painless - loved.
Together.
How you make me fearless.
Your lips on my forehead -
I am safe.  
And we are together.
One day, none of this will matter.
That day is today.
And you are all I see.

I could hear it from the kitchen
Coffee maker bubbling
Stomach rumbling
I could hear him throwing up
ADHD meds worked
But made him sick a lot

Poor little baby boy
I had to hide from the sick
Afraid of insides outside
And I could hear his tears fall and dry
Brother, sister, comforting
Giggling
Holding his hair back

When the sick was gone
I ventured in  
The sick boy, better now
Big brother filling up his bath tub
Dreadlocks *******
Toys that wind up
Warm water
Soap bubbles
Happy face

Big brother cleans the sick off
Little cups of water down his back
Tickles his face
Kisses his forehead
Loving, bubbling
Sick like brother

I watch and learn love
And I'm in love with it all

Big brother helps big sister with homework
I stay with sick baby boy
His red popsicle melts into his bathwater
But stays in his tummy
He tells me about school

I listen and learn love
And I fall in love with it all over again

This is how you're used
When I'm self afflicted
Self degrading
Self abused
He speaks through you
So I can breathe
This is what you mean to me
When I'm sick
And beat
And bruised
This is how God uses you
When you could choose
When you could lose
You love me and that's how He uses
YOU

In the winter
You'll hold my hand
And I'll hold her life
In mine

So small
So fragile
So shiny
Ours

Any minute now
Something will happen
My feet are stuck to the ground
But soon, I'll be free
Soon I don't have to be me anymore
Any minute now
Something will change
A new job
A new life
A new name

A new name
A new job
A new life
Soon, I'll be someone's mother
Someone's wife
Don't know when
Don't know how
I just know it's not now
But I'll wait
I have nothing else to do
Something will happen to me
I just hope it's you

God I'm stuck
I wish I could sit down
I wish I could run
But I'm stuck
**** it all
I can't move
I can't fall
Any minute now
Maybe I'll get a call
Life is stalling me
And I'm done with it all
Any minute now
Any minute now
Any minute now
Any minute now

Something will happen

One day
It'll just be Sunday morning pancakes
Church with our friends
Cleaning the house with the windows open
Music shaking the rafters in our ceiling
We'll make dinner together
You'll kiss me til your lips are raw
And we'll laugh until we cry and make love until bed

One day
It'll just be Monday morning coffee
We'll stay in bed just a little longer
Crack the window to smell the rain
I'll make your lunch and kiss you a million times goodbye
Off to school I'll go, little preschool voices, little fingers wave "Hi"
Dinner will be waiting for you
Plate warm, warm welcome
We'll eat and laugh and make love

One day
It'll just be Wednesday evenings together
Doing homework, working late
Your eyes droopy, smile goofy
Giggling sleep away
Falling asleep at your desk
I drag you to bed
And stroke away the day with my fingertips

One day
It'll just be Friday night with us
We'll get Mongolian, we'll see a movie
You smile at me when the lights go down
And squeeze my hand tighter
Popcorn fingers
Sneaking little kisses in the dark
And you make love to me when we get home

One day
It'll just be Saturday mornings, slow
Sleep in late, wake up happy
While we try and get some work done
In between calculator buttons and pencil strokes
You ****** me, again and again
And our work gets postponed over and over
One person
One marriage
One life
One day

It'll just be Sunday morning pancakes
Forever

A million fireflies
Clouds glowing
Growing eyes
Feet patter
Rain meets fire
I whisper as I go
Along I stride
In fear they hide
Yelling, smelling salts
Wake up
Shake up
Stand up
Rise
Beyond the gate lies
Lies
Goodbye
I make no sense
I write

This hand you cling so tight to
Why you think I'd ever fight you
Every leave you, ever go
Tell me why, I do not know

These eyes you love so dearly
Why you think they'd ever really
Look away, I am not sure
But there's no other him or her

It's only you,
It's only ever
This will always be forever
Here we are and here we'll be
While you are you and I am me

I fall asleep -
Curled up small above the cab of the camper -
My eyes drawn to the pools of night in your face below -
My hand hanging down so my fingers brush your forehead -
I stare, for as long as my eyes will stay open -
Below me -
The face of my forever.

I'm staring at the open wardrobe door
From my bed, across the room
Begging God to let me go back
And listen to you tell me about the clay ball and rubber ball and the open door

The thought of your psychics sends me crying into bed

Time without
huuhh
The respirator
huuhh
Is good practice
huuhh
For the lungs
huuhh
But every breath
huuhh
Is still
huuhh
A ludicrous pain