half-formed poems
catastrophizing stuck in my head
until i think i’ll burst if i don’t
say
something
and then it’s there stuck in my throat
when i remember
actual
catastrophes
all while i’m too tired to sleep
and too sad to cry
and everything feels like a clock ticking down
down
down
but to what
inevitable
terror?
[or is this simply life in late-stage capitalism/climate crisis disaster?]
i think
my “problem”
is that i have big picture
thinking
with tiny detail
brain
and that just makes everything
overwhelming
all the time
~~~
like
i can see the whole planet
and each conflict
and how the systems lead to suffering
and how it
literally
doesn’t
need
to be
this way
but instead of just thinking about the systems
i then ‘zoom in’ and see
each country
each family
each child
each breath of the earth
suffering
suffering
suffering
and i am stuck
because i don’t want to look away
for fear i’ve cheapened
their individual
suffering
and story
but it’s hard to hold
hundreds
thousands
millions
billions
of people’s individual narratives
in a brain trained to only concentrate on one’s own
so i panic
and breathe hard
and fast
and when the feeling has finally passed
there’s the guilt
there’s the guilt
and i know it’s all going to happen
again and again and again
~~~
so how in this world do i utilize
my big picture imagination and individual compassion
without falling into
obsession?
without falling into the chain reaction of
‘i’ve decided to help one thing/cause/person —
‘but wait, this other person has it worse/’
‘but wait, this other cause is more just/’
‘but wait, this other thing runs so much deeper
and has its tendrils in so many of the other
horrors of this world…’
how do i stop my decision paralysis
when it comes to helping
human decency?
[i honestly don’t know
do you?]
it’s the helplessness that gets to me
not that i feel
un-helped
but how unhelpful i feel to those
i know
are suffering.
the disappointment i feel in my own government
in my own daily interaction with the people of this country
or even the world
maybe i should start writing fiction more
just to be able to be around the people i enjoy
and in spaces where i’m not
constantly hounded by the existential depression of
“this could be so much better
but it just
isn’t”
keep on writing
keep on finding
what little things are left to find
in this world/state/city/life
and maybe, one day, someone else will want to read what you have to say
where did these sads come from?
why do they appear
in the midst of what should be
a happy time?
how are they somehow
related
to that happy time?
like i can’t let myself
get swept up in the moment —
i need to remind myself
in every moment
of joy
that despair
and tragedy
exists.
like if i let go
of the depression
that runs everything,
the glue that holds my whole being
together
will loosen
and split
and i’ll fall
apart;
and i just want
to be
myself
[someday]
[someday]
a big sad
an overwhelming wave
of the depression i know best—-
we should be friends by now;
i see them nearly every day,
but their company is always unwelcome
and puts a stop to any idea i had for my day
the worst part
of my particular depression/sadness/melancholia
is that it makes me feel
like all this writing
(which really does make me feel a little bit better)
isn’t
actually
worth
any
effort
at
all
chugging along
the energy it takes
to simply press a key
with a fingertip
expands
exponentially
and i start feeling
exhausted
the fits and starts and stops and hiccups
the pulsating of a pulse part of me wishes didn’t exist
the tears coming to eyes that somehow still can’t cry
the thousand-yard stare into the nothingness of existence
the loneliness felt even when i know so many feel this
and my best friend is sitting mere feet away from me
the vignette of darkness shading the corners of my vision
of my image for my life now
and this poem is taking too long
and has too many words saying nothing at all
all i want to write
is
depression is hard.
what would happen if i were
completely and totally honest
about my bouts with depression?
if, when greeted with the cursory
“how are you?”
i answered “contemplating the fall of all existence
and whether that wouldn’t be a humane thing to do
for all the other beings that have to
live in the terrible shadow of
humanity
as it exists today”
instead of the expected
“fine, thanks! and you?”
and what if
during the winter months
instead of apologizing
i expected others to feel
my plight:
when someone contacted me
i wouldn’t say sorry
for taking so long to reply
i’d commend them for getting past their
seasonal
sadness
just to put forth this email to me
and make no excuses
when months passed
before an actual answer
was sent back
i wish i could answer honestly
when people do implore about
how my mental health has been
but
when faced with an actual, human face
i’m reminded of the love i feel for some individuals
and, honestly, humanity as a whole
(though our society has breathed a dire flame
into the heart of the hoard of us)
why else would i care so hard
about masking up in a global pandemic
and fighting for the rights of those
who are both like
and unalike
me;
and i don’t want to cause someone else distress
on the off chance they actually care about my own personhood
the way i care about theirs
(a crazy concept to me, to be sure, but one i can conceptualize
even if i can’t quite understand
from inside my own head)
so i say i’m great
sometimes a noncommittal “okay”
to let them know i’m not actually a constant bright rainbow
and i can understand what it’s like
to have a bad day
(or month or year or life or whatever)
to give them a space
to open up if they need to express
the thoughts they keep inside their own head
and never let out.
and it feels both compulsion
and need now
to be the person i’d need
but i honestly don’t know how i’d react
if someone like me opened up that door—
i think i’d still turn it on its head
and return the favor harder
knowing they probably need it
more
(so why can’t i read this back
and put forth the idea that
i might have written it
in response to my needs?)
(nah, whoever wrote it isn’t me
and needs me
far more than i need someone like me)
i wish i understood
my own moods:
where the deep depth of despair
comes from/
what makes it open its great maw
and swallow me whole
just to spit me out
a day or two [or a few] later
is it hormonal?
is it simply having a new experience on the agenda?
how am i happier when i’m about to do a novel activity
but also my anxiety
flies in the face of everything?
why can’t my brain/body/heart connection
calm down enough
to understand
to comprehend
to compassion and savor and
everything in-between?
i can feel myself begin to understand
that not understanding may be an important part
of connecting with my truest self.
but i’m an analytical little kip,
and understanding is how i start
to accept and love parts of myself,
so this seemingly completely randomized set of emotions
and emotional turmoil
just makes me want to comprehend it more/
hold it tighter/
because letting it go
and be
seems
the surest way for it to take over…
(but in what way doesn’t it take over
every
single
time?)
i’m hesitant
i’m breathing
i’m waiting
to understand
or to understand that i don’t need to understand
and i’m trying to prepare myself
for not understanding
but it’s so
damn
scary
-on a precipice-
i don’t really know
what i’m writing this morning
i just know
i wish i had
some
dopamine/serotonin/anything
to keep me company
through this season
~~~
is my
not having
an up-to-date phone
just a reminiscence of being
four versions out of date
in my aol/internet service
and therefore
a form of
comfort?
~~~
writing poems
and hearing the rhymes
that didn’t make it in
but somehow
making the poem
fuller
is a weird sort of poet magic
kipventures 