I Do Not Want to Be God

Depression has its teeth in me today.
I feel that, no matter what I do,
It is meaningless.  I feel like King Solomon.
And for those who depend on me?

For example, my geckos.  I provide food,
I make it rain in their small enclosure.
I fill the rock with water, I watch, looking on,
Yet they age, and they eventually die.

I used to love so many things -
Painting, drawing, art of all kinds,
Experimenting, photography, judo,
Hiking, swimming, being a warrior.

I was a warrior.  In Kuwait.
And then I got this illness -
They call it PTSD and Depression
Often goes with it.  I see why.

Nightmares, flashbacks, voices,
Anxiety, hypervigilance, too many threats,
And everybody - everybody - is a threat.
Cannot trust anyone.  If you do, you are dead.

The memories are painful, but they are all
You have.  They keep you forever in the War,
Never releasing you to live a life in the present.
Forever a warrior in the War, mistakes and death.

Nothing relieves the pressure except spilling
Out all of the toxins to the one man you trust -
The psychiatrist.  Took eight years to build that.
And it would only take a second to destroy.

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