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 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

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.