Engulfing Despair

Engulfing Despair

Disgust with myself swallows me whole.
I am nauseous with longing, irritated with my wants.
My sense of humor is deserting me.
My capacity for giving is running on empty
Without the fuel of intimacy to replenish it.
No one knows the depth of my solitude.
“Don’t let yourself get hurt,” my concerned friends say.
But how can you not, when what you need
Is eluding you, escaping you, taunting you?
Maybe it is the estrogen eating away at my progesterone.
I keep forgetting to apply the damn cream.
No expectations. That’s what I should strive for.
No expectations. Then there is no disappointment.
No expectations. But then there’s no dreaming. No daring.
I am sucked dry. Full of cravings and numb at the same time.
I should be grateful to be alive, thankful to be breathing
All that polluted, global-warming-heavy, stifling air.
And I am. For a while.
And then I am right back to teetering on the edge.
I felt this way two years ago.
I crawled into a dark abyss and stayed there the whole summer.
And most of the fall.
I don’t want to go back there.
I don’t want to wallow.
I don’t want pity.
Ten days until I either implode or jump out of my skin.
What I first saw as a favorable sign has become poisonous.
What I first thought was true friendship turns out to be nothing but imbalance.
What I first imagined as a dream-come-true has morphed into a nightmare.
Why can’t I rest?
Why can’t I leave it alone?
Why can’t I be a quiet human being?

Saffi Darsanac
July 7, 2008