The Confused State of an Anxious Mind

I don’t know where to begin.

Maybe this is not even a poem.

But I want to tell you how anxiety feels.

My heart races at the speed of light.

And my brain slams the break pedal.

Can you feel what happens then?

The laws of physics, inertia, motion, Newton.

All come flashing back in my head.

I never liked physics anyway.

But I cant help it.

My thoughts are racing backwards.

I need to get out of here.

I think I’m gonna die.
I think I’m gonna fail.
I think he’s going to forget me.
I think my mother just had an accident.
She hasn’t called me in an hour.

I ask my brain to stop.

Or maybe it is my brain asking itself to stop.

I don’t know. Im confused.

But my heart.

Oh my heart loves to run.

140 beats per minute.

Running towards the finish line.
Running to save my life.
Running to study for that test.
Running to beg him to stay.
Running towards my mother.

What do you do when two parts of your body move in different directions?

I cannot breathe.

Sometimes I think it is all in my imagination.

At least that is what someone told me.

“Relax, nothing’s happening. Why are you so anxious?”

If everything’s my imagination,

Then why can’t I draw pictures of it?

Why can’t I write a book about it?

Why does my body respond to something that I’m creating?

I take deep breaths.

Sometimes into a brown paper bag.

Sometimes I have panic attacks.

Once in the movies with my friends.

The muscles in my chest tighten and I cannot breathe.

It is embarrassing.

This is why I’ve become a recluse.

I don’t know when anxiety is going to hit me.

I need to be alone.

I don’t know why anxiety hits me.

I just wish it didn’t feel like home.

Sweet Summer of Twelve

Sweet summer of twelve standing in the balcony of my room
on the third floor of our huge house facing the gurgling river a few yards ahead,
I felt a touch of sky dropping on my shoulders.
Gods had given me a gift- the weight of the whole world rested inside my frail heart.

I remember it was the same fall of twelve, a few months later
I was standing in the same balcony,
only it was the sky that was gurgling. Pouring and screaming, clashing and crying.
I stood there in the middle of the night. Not quite in the middle; it was 2 a.m.
I hated the rain, and I wanted to die.

I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t jump, I couldn’t cut, I couldn’t overdose.
I was weak. I was brave. I was unhappy. I was not enough. I was never enough.

I stood in the rain to torture myself. I was scared of the thunder. I was controlling my fears.

I felt limitless.

I thought a lot about suicide that night. Sounds insane but I wanted a chance.
One shot at the power to control my life; even if it meant during my death.

Sometimes freedom is all you really need.

Freedom. Freedom. Freedom.

I moved places, I saw faces, I saw freedom, I saw more pain. The more you have, the more you need.

Freedom is to dive off cliffs and kiss strangers, smoke pot and watch the stars, sleep until you drift away into oblivion, wake up, pack your bags, and
move on someplace else because the freedom you have is not enough.

Freedom is to let go of such expectations, yet hold on to your dreams, embrace your sadness, turn it into a weapon,
feel every single breath your lover takes,
see the grass, see the sky, see yourself in the mirror, see what you really are and not look away.

Wild winter of fifteen, I stand in a different balcony looking at a lake
calm and vast, the weight of the grey sky turning it into a deep shade of silver.
It looks beautiful.

The same winter of fifteen, I choose to live.
Live while I’m alive, live after I die, my organs in the bodies of strangers,
my dreams in the minds of millions,
my sadness in the struggles of every depressed person,
my hopes in the insides of their hearts.

I cry. You cry.
I am depressed. My friend has social anxiety.
Another one is schizophrenic.
Another one told me he was seeing a therapist.

I am depressed. You are not.
Yet we are the same.
One day we shall realize that the borders we have
are just lines on sand
easy to create, easier to cross.
I shall donate my organs, you shall donate your hopes.
Hopes and organs and bodies and dreams and
hurts and fears
different for each, same for all.
The universe stops only at a full circle.