i wish i could find what’s missing
what makes doing and going someplace new
feel like i’m trudging through a battlefield
except artillery and rifle fire
are the unfamiliar places and people
where everything is bright and too loud
shadowy people with waxy faces
an alien dream
this is my nightmare

“i’m sure it’ll be fine”
is the social balm
for my nothing problem
doesn’t make me feel better
who’s scared to go places
freak

i’m exhausted
my mind is spinning and spinning like
i’m running for my life
i’m trying to dodge thoughts and possibilities
they pop out at me like too-tall cartoon characters, clowns with bleeding make-up and boulders waiting to crush me
imagining conversations with strangers like there is a ringing in my head
dragging my thoughts together
like a bunch of trampled papers
fearing words that might come out wrong, a response or joke i hear incorrectly
the more i know about myself
the more i think, i am in the world differently
i ask my therapist
what does it matter, she says
a proper diagnosis
is too expensive