Thump Thump.
Butterflies crawl in my chest.
Thoughts swirl around in my head.
I can’t focus or see straight.
This is anxiety.

And it’s not something I
talk about often, though it’s
more common than one might
think, where my heart pounds so
loud and anxious
thoughts threaten to
drown out everything
that makes me,
Me.

You see, my brain sees simple
things incorrectly.
Texts and sometimes the
thought of leaving the
house sends
adrenaline coursing through my
system like
a thousand shots of caffeine
into my bloodstream.
The logical parts of me fled on the
first flight out of town,
leaving me to feel the tremors and
full force tsunami
on the ground.

Anxiety is a lot like love,
but it’s a battle not a dance.
A lifetime, not five minutes.
Unlike love, it’s often violent.
But just like love, it’s quite silent.

Anxiety feels like hunger, but stronger.
Like fear, but it lasts longer.
Writing this poem has quelled the
qualms that anxiety often spells.

I wish that I could be honest
about this part of me. But it's
one of those things you’re trained
not to talk about from a young age.
Because unless you’re depressed,
medicated, or heaven forbid
you’re not seeing a therapist,
then it’s not bad enough to qualify.
It’s not big enough to report.
I’m not suffering enough.

But if you could just feel
my heart beating fast.
If you could interpret the swell
of my tell-tale blush.
If you could whisk your fingers
through all of my thoughts.
If you could only
hear all of the things I’m feeling
but can’t quite express.
Then you would know that my
silence is telling.
I may be smiling, but currently I’m
fighting for sanity in my own mind.
The mind I feel is no longer mine.
I’m walking a dangerous
tightrope *****.
My mind is a minefield of poisonous
butterflies.
They threaten to swallow me alive, so
I tread the violence quietly.

I fear when I expose you to this
side of me, you’ll only see anxiety
or that maybe I’m lying.
But anxiety is not me.
I am more than mixed up brain signals.

The rest of me is cardigans in the summer,
because it’s cold inside.
I am mock converse and ponytails and
words on paper,
thoughts poured out,
slowly.

I just feel anxious
Sometimes.
More than normal, actually.
But I’m dealing with it.
And I’m no less me.