Phobia

A recollection of the panic attack that set my phobia of reading out loud into motion.

I want to talk about the day I had a panic attack
in my Advanced Composition class,
How when the teacher called my name,
I became the deer in the headlights,
How it felt like being chased and strangled
at the same time.
The adrenaline burned in my blood,
made my hands tremble and my fingers numb.
The hormone demanded that I fight or flee,
but there was nowhere to run, nothing to fight,
Just a classroom full of strangers
waiting for me to read them one paragraph.

The words were blocks of lead covered in glue,
the English language, suddenly foreign in my mouth.
I force out sentences so fast,
I forget how to breathe.
Finally, the weight comes crashing down.
My voice breaks like a wooden board,
And I finish on the verge of bursting
into tears.

Within the week, I see a psychiatrist.
I’m prescribed Valium,
And I spend the remainder of the semester high
because I’m nothing but a coward.