Despair

“This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but a whimper.”

 T.S. Eliot

“My life is a perfect graveyard of buried hopes.”

 L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

“my beerdrunk soul is sadder than all the dead christmas trees of the world.”

 Charles Bukowski

“Life ... is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.”

 William Shakespeare, Macbeth

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It hovers over my soul

Bending like a sinister, malevolent being

Whispering dark nothings into my ear

Slowly driving me into the deep shadows

Where hope and love

Disappear

Dissolved by its malign power

It is my constant companion these days

this despair

that presses down on me

stilling my fingers as the poise over the key board

stiffening my smile

making my brain roil with meaningless noise

leaving me unfocused and barely function

it takes so little

to sadden

and agitate

an unexpected response

a surprising complication

it may not be true

but it feels as though my words wound rather than heal

as if I offend rather than convince

as if my actions fall short rather than accomplish

everything seems to stall, stagger

unravel, complicate, erode

it is two steps forward, three steps back

I hope

I believe

That this condition is not permanent

Or terminal

That someday the clouds will clear

And the sun will shine

I affirm that though “outwardly I am wasting away

Inwardly I am being renewed, day by day”

But on this day

On this dreary day

The light is dim

I need a comforter

(thanks be to God)

“I shall ask the Father to give you someone else to stand by you,

to be with you always.”  John 14:16)