generalized anxiety disorder

December 3, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

what a weird week
said multiple people these past seven days
not necessarily bad
(nor good either)
just
weird.

and i have to agree;
going from being terrified to submit to anything,
theatre/
film/
voiceover/
experimental/
at all
(for fear of the inevitable
no-reply rejection)
i submitted to three things in two days
and got auditions for over half
(still have to audition,
but damn
does it feel like
the relief
of crawling out of a ravine
but looking up to see
more walls surrounding you
again)

man

i chose this.

November 26, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

the mood:
negative

the mood:
dour

the mood:
almost happy
for a little while

the mood:
existential

the mood:
hopeless

the mood:
hopeful
for once
hold on to it

it’s gone

the mood:
emptiness
is there a mood at all?

the mood:
cyclical
i should be used to it by now

the mood:
ever-changing
ever-growing
ever-morphing
into a new mood
a new emotion
a new thing to think and remember and grow

the mood:
i’m not worried
about my mood
(is
this
happiness?)

the mood:
how did i even get here?
to this place?
to this age?
to this mood?
to this hair?
to this me?

the mood:

the mood:

the mood:

[did i discover anything of substance?]

October 11, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

oh no
the anxiety
it’s coming
it’s here
it’s pulsing
fluttering
buzzing
it’s blossoming
like a spiky rose
a giant sunflower
blooming unbelievably
over my head
(though i should believe—
i know
i’m small)

the beauty of anxiety
is not to be confused
with how it feels inside—
fluttering heartbeats
expectations of failures
the writing
and re-writing
and re-re-wriiting
of this poem
countless times
(and none of them will ever be enough)

no

the beauty of anxiety
comes from the knowledge
the observance
the wisdom
that the cycle is never-ending
and what you thought was healing
was really just a bending
of psychological mishaps
into a faint shadow of mental health
that you thought was a calm against the storm—
but the running against the clock
of the battery conking out
(and the files saved in an un-safe way
and the computer trying hard on its last legs
and everything feeling like its falling apart
even thought you know you could [have] do[ne] something to stop)—
that’s anxiety
and that’s the beauty and the ugliness
the ‘you could have changed computers months ago’
‘you should have charged your laptop last night’
‘you really need to clear out space
in every device
you live
your life
inside’
but you didn’t
you don’t
you never do
because somehow
the experience of anxiety
relies heavily
on knowing what you could/should do
and never having done it
because somehow
you feel you
deserve
this

dread.

June 9, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

how is my head
so good
at telling me what’s real,
but also
so sneaky
at telling me
what could be?

when my emotions are out of control,
when my logic has failed me,
my mind is the savior
who reminds me–
‘obsess not on the past
or the future;
life is life,
not a rehearsal,
not a rough draft,
chill here
and you will end up
enjoying it
i swear’

but when my emotions
are at the beginning
of fraught-ness,
my mind is the one
logic-ing me to terror:
‘even if this goes
the best it could possibly go,
there are still so many bad things
that could happen
as a result’
or
‘you’re feeling good–
need i remind you
that there are children starving
not just halfway around the world
but also down the street?
ah, i do need to remind you;
there are animals being uselessly abused,
others being wastefully killed,
the planet is dying,
and so are black people
at the the hands of those hired under the guise
of protection,
but now we know
that they are not legally required to do so.
but what of the people who still can’t see it–
as a white person, is it not your job
to tell those other white folks
how disastrous
and dangerous
their opinions plus their power
is?’

and on and on and on and on
my mind saving me from myself
and then serving me up on a silver platter
for my anxieties to take over
subject matter by subject matter
and the cycle continues
(and i at least know how much
i hate
circles)

May 18, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

staring at your phone
won’t make your boredom alleviate,
but i do it anyway.

procrastinating your projects
won’t make them arrive any slower,
but guess what i do.

stress dreaming about choreography,
about packing and school long since freed,
or any sort of event approaching at gathering speed,
doesn’t seem to help in the least,
but that’s what my subconscious thinks will help me.

~~~

i can sometimes feel the stress
in my forehead
when i’m contemplating life,
or doom-scrolling through each app
that brings me no joy, only sorrow,

and when i feel
my muscles tightened,
and my eyebrows furrowed,
and my body edging towards taking on
on a tenseness i haven’t felt since college,
i try to relax that part of my face
where the stress enters.
and sometimes it does help
(and sometimes it does not)

~~~

i make lists,
but sometimes i wonder if
i’d be a more mellow human
were i to simply
not.

April 1, 2022

/ HJ / Leave a comment

April
Fool me once
shame on you
Fool me twice
blame the day.

i actually have no concrete qualms
of this Fools of April
day
but i’m morally against
any pranks or fooling
in bad taste
that do harm

(i mean, i’m against harm
being done
at all)

pranks i enjoy
are things like
Rick-Rolling
and
innocent claims
truthed-up in a moment,
no elaborate schemes
or embarrassment on the prankee.

as a child/teen
i spent the entirety of the 1st
high on my guard
looking at everything
with suspicious eyes,
i felt my entire nervous system
throughout the day
ready to spring
at the tiniest possible stimulant
(how i didn’t know i had anxiety…?)

but i don’t know
what i’m trying to say
with this poem today

i guess
just
don’t be mean,
and give your friends
with generalized anxiety disorder
a break
(since they certainly aren’t going to give themselves one
until midnight oh one
on the second)