It is a curious irony that my first poetry book, 365 Universes, was written, started to be written, almost exactly 10 years ago. It turned out, by chance, to be a partial reflection of an 18-month period of extreme hypochondria driven anxiety, over a year of hell; weakness, sickness, inability to eat or sleep. And today, my second poetry book is released at a time when the same affliction is back, although a little different. Now I worry about others more than myself; something yet more beyond my control.
My state for the past week has swung between constant vigilance, pains across my back and chest as though being watched by a cold spectre, and panic, although I seem to be getting more rest than in the first few days. Perhaps the dramatic changes to the country this week would inevitably cause similar disruptions to many people. We are all part of a unit, a whole. The feelings of the bees reflect the feelings of the hive, and vice versa. By the same token, our cells perhaps feel the same, aggrieved at our bodies disruptive chemistry. We worry for ourselves, our loved ones, our country, our world, our universe. Is this worry active, that we create worry for these echelons; or passive, a sympathetic response to the disruption elsewhere? Anxiety is merely the breaking of connections, so that new ones can be formed. It is the burn of its acid which is uncomfortable.
My sleep patterns seem to involve falling asleep at 11pm or so, waking in a panic as though from a nightmare at 2am or so, remaining awake until 6am, then sleeping again. I noted that this, excluding panic, is typical for me anyway. I read that, in pre-industrial times, people used to naturally sleep twice per night. I've only slept throughout the night for one night this year. One strategy is to extend the time before I wake for the first time, and shrink the time before I sleep again; closing that 'hole of sleep' in the middle of the night. I've used this in the past to good effect.
Deb said something useful, that anxiety is always there, it's part of our personality. Trying to make it vanish only makes it worse, we much instead accept it, and accept its benefits.
My parents have gone out. I don't know where or why. Their exposure to danger unnerves me. I feel too dysfunctional today to do much, but will press on with distant launch duties for The Burning Circus.
Perhaps my experiences of 10 years ago were training for this moment.
But no, we attach our ego and will to actions which occur and would have occurred anyway. The phrase 'everything happens for a reason' is born of ego; we see patterns where there are none. The notion of cause followed by effect is a similar egotistical manifestation. We decide that which is a cause; yet if were are merely leaves on the stream, how can we live? Is ego necessarily strong and weak, able to grow and shrink in some evolutionary dance of the relative interactions of existence?
