Labyrinth of the Blind (description of a depressive episode)

I am throwing peanut shells in the fire
like kindling
like gossip
the kind of dry, unsubstantiated fodder
that hungry flames feed on.

I'm getting tipsy on gin and limes,
the moon-shine of full agreement.
Clouds are forming a canopy of heavy blankets
woven with depressive fibers.
It's almost as if someone loving
is laying them across my shoulders
as if they were made for me
as if they were comforting.
But reality seems an ocean, black and bottomless.
The corners of my mouth are cement shoes
and this night is a potter's field.

If I occupy the darkness...
let loose my attachment to the illumination I can find,
I will be lost
and only a deity can find me there,
in the ink spot,
the labyrinth of the unseeing.

Failure To Thrive

I have lost touch.
Did you know hormones have curled my hair?
But only my pull knows the wavy spring
or the way ringlets wind around my finger
as soft limbs entwining a lovers body.

She touches my wrist
says "unfist your hand"
I look down to find a truth I did not know.
These clenched hands always prepared now
to defend
shoulders hunched and ready.

My fingers open to her suggestion
life line exposed
both her hands grab my palm
thumbs firmly stroking the trigger points
on the ear of an agitated dog.

I think to cry.
I want to.
Inside I did...
stomach distended with all that is unreleased.
And I know why babies fail to thrive without
touch.
At 49 I am such a child.

Yet God knows I have need.
The wind came up against my sweating flesh
with it's playground hands, bigger than my body!
They touched everywhere at once
my lips, my arms, my heaving belly
tussling my hair in a way that felt like nurture.
Oh mother, wherefore art thou?
I was touched.

Can a breeze be enough?

I reached out yesterday.
Her judgement harmed me, caged me further.
I am so set back that I consider I will always be alone
in wait for the wind.
.
.
.
.
.

I guess I need the meds

(Prologue - I am fine. This was a mental note. This was me off my medication for two weeks and the bottom dropped out. Quickly. It dropped out quickly. Today you have no cause for concern. The fact that I want to hide this mess is all the more reason to shine a light on it.)



Is it suicide if you just write the note?
Lusting is equivalent to adultery. So....
I must be dead.

I lied to myself for a vague moment somewhere in yesterdays window. I guess I am depressed. I've quite the talent for talking myself into things. Such a pity my talents do not extend to talking myself out. I suppose it's unfortunate how well I can fool you. But don't fear your gullibility. I used myself as practice and I really did think it was true. I lied when I consoled my shaking hand with a preemptive strike against what was surely coming. As sure as the sun sets, hopelessness rises.

I lied when I told myself I had choices, but you'll be happy to note I've been set straight. I have no choices. I have no rights. As surely as I read it, it must be fact.

I lied when I said I'd seen the limitless bottom, for today I saw how hungry it was, and that kind of appetite is never satisfied. It will return again and again until I lay myself out as a banquet. Submission and surrender are so highly praised! Thereby, I will be praised.

Do not fight for yourself. Happiness is irrelevant. The most content among us will tell you...it isn't even biblical. The blood from your battles will only alert the wolves. In the end they will chant the familiar lullaby, "you are wrong you are wrong you are wrong." You can hardly fault them for it! Truth is truth, and "I know" will be the last thing you whisper before they eat your heart. It's some kind of sick joke to have your feelings be wrong. There seems no choice but to lie. Who the hell wants to be wrong all the time?


----------------------------------

It's taken about twenty minutes for the meds to kick in, for the calm stepford wife of reason and sense to take charge.

"Which Annie ARE you?"
Hell if I know.
But the one I was
pushed "publish"
before the one I am.


(That was the darkest place I've been. So far. I am deeply disturbed by the contrast but I want to remember and logically look at these feelings in a different moment.)


..
.
.