When you say that life is easy,
a little frustration is as bad as it gets,
I ask you what you were doing at age six.

were you running through the park?
playing with your friends?
doing nothing much?
careless of the world?

What if your whole life is determined at age six?

When I say that life is hard,
it's never been a good thing,
you ask me what I was doing at age six.

I was running through the fields, hoping I'd forget.
I talked to almost no one,
doing nothing much.
I cared too much about the smallest things and just hoped that it would stop.
It never stopped.

Six was the age I accepted that I would never be happy.
I knew I was different but I thought it would fade,
that maybe I'd forget and be able to stay.

But my whole life was determined at age six.

The darkness that surrounds you,
Comes from inside you,
Those attacks of panic,
Making you sink like the Titanic,
You try and try to stop the water from coming in,
But the hole in your heart is too big,
Between death and life,
Throughout your strife,
Throughout your battle,
I am completely rattled when those doors open in your heart,
They let all the water come in,
And down you go,
Like a gun and a doe.

I woke up today and I felt like I couldn’t breathe.

The grips of a dream tightly coiled around my throat as it forced me to acknowledge it.

I was a failure.

That was basically it.

And I knew that grades don’t define who you are, but they get you into university, they get you a good course, a good degree, a good job.

Money.

And then I won’t have to suffer living without it.

And I knew that money don’t buy you happiness, but they buy peace of mind.

How many times has my mum stayed awake worrying about how much to give and how much to keep?

One time my mum refused to send money back for the treatment of her grandmother. Not because she was selfish, but because my brother and I had taken to crying because we had no lunch.

She found out I hid away in libraries to stave off hunger while my brother hid in toilets.

Her grandmother died less than a week later.

The way guilt plagues her every breath even now…

Since then we vowed as a family to share what we have, even if we have so little.

Money buys safety. There are two red flashing lights on my mum’s dashboard of her car. When she took it to a garage she was told she’d have to get it fixed for a ridiculous amount of price because her break pads had no grip and her steering was askew.

She refused to pay that much for her own safety because her mother’s sister just died and someone has to pay the funeral.

Now she prays extra hard every time she drives.

Money buys my future.

Money.

If I fail my exam, I won’t have it.



Now I’m in my brother’s room because apparently I screamed into my pillow and apparently the panic attacks were back.

I called the school for a tactical day-off.

why won't someone tell me
what they know
or is it all a show
I can't really tell
the spasms
touches of sarcasm
the flakes of fakes
like a self conscious woman
I follow you
blindly
i follow
but now i wallow
as your actions hit me
like a heart attack
maybe I am just being dramatic
It's a panic
shaken bones
my mind has grown
It's just a panic
a panic.