My Umbrella in the Storm

Photo by Eunice Stahl on Unsplash

It’s just a house

With a brick façade

And an east facing door,

Where the afternoon sun

Reflects off the hardwood.

Not the dream house.

Not a cottage or a manor

Or a loft or a cabin.

Just a house on a busy street

In an ever-changing suburb.

Only fifteen hundred square feet

Of this beautiful world.

Here,

I am home

And when I leave,

I take my keys

Along with the anxiety

That tinges everything I see

Of this beautiful world

Like the green tinted glasses

In the Emerald City.

Out there is

The swirl of uncontrollable thoughts,

The tunneled vision,

The shallow breaths.

The tumult of baseless feelings,

The roiling stomach,

The tingling hands.

The blurred line

Between thoughts and reality.

In this world,

Where grocery store lines

Where doctor’s waiting rooms

Where elevators and unexpected conversations

Can set off panic

That I don’t understand

And can’t control,

There is only fifteen hundred square feet

Where it all falls away.

And isn’t it strange

How a few small rooms

Can make it easier to breathe

When a world that’s so big

Can feel like it’s closing in?

It’s just a house

Where the panic can’t find me,

Where I can stop

For just a moment,

Stop looking for signs

Of an impending attack.

Stop the self-fulfilling prophecy

Nature saw fit to bestow.

Home,

My umbrella in the storm

Of my own malignant thoughts.

This small piece of the world,

An island surrounded

By a raging sea.