The Anatomy of Melancholy
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The Good.....
|
In the middle of
The yin
symbol is a small
White dot: a seedling.
|
In today's snowy
Mud-fest - there is the sneaking Semblance of good cheer. |
Today I planted
A box hedge:
enclosing the
Willow in magic.
|
You kindly bought me
Self-help books: including a
Magical blue one.
|
I have installed the
Antuivirus; all I need
Now is to re-boot.
|
Escape into The
Lord of the Rings - better
Than medication. |
May it be a light
For you in
dark places when
All other lights go....
|
Reprogramme the
brain;
Upload luminous thoughts and
Precious memories.
|
If you have no good
Memories
- then steal some
From somebody else.
|
The brain cannot
tell
A fake smile from a real
Smile; so get smiling.
|
Smiling releases
Endorphins:
so get smiling
You crazy fucker.
|
Re-boot; relearn;
change;
Reprogramme; reactivate;
Rediscover; change. |
Attempt to record;
Attempt to expunge; attempt
To transmogrify.
|
MOT the car
Pump
the tyres, top-up the
Petrol: take control.
|
On dark afternoons
We happily played on the
Yarmouth Harbour rocks.
|
When you were young
We played football in the hall:
With you as goalie.
|
Winter on Mousehold:
Sledges bouncing down St James'
Hill; then the trek
back.
|
On the climbing wall
There is only the now; no
Dark rumination.
|
Give up comfort
food;
The chocolate digestives
And the jam dounuts. |
Hand-hold,
foot-hold; pull;
Move; reach; feel the body
Inch up
the incline.
|
Between your teeth -
place
A pencil to simulate
Smiling: worth a try.
|
Hope fluttered
across
The autumn forest today:
Insubstantial bird.
|
Don't worry
'bout a
Thing, 'cause every little thing
Gonna be
alright.
|
Planting trees all
day
With a pencil between my
Teeth. Does smiling
work? |
Future photograph:
The four of us - arm in arm
Smiling and stronger.
|
Girl on a beach:
hair
Waving like seaweed; laughter
Falling like the
waves.
|
Even if you get
No enjoyment from something
Do it anyway.
|
Lyrica and love
And AC/DC at vol
Ten keep me alive.
|
Synapses are
starting
To re-fire: odd facts recalled;
Odd fragments of
wit.
|
I would like to see
Towering El Capitan
In Yosemite. |
Or the fulmars and
Gannets on the dizzying
Cliffs of St Kilda.
|
Yes, I have lately
Suffered a sea-change into
Something rich and
strange.
|
Brief window in the
Brain-fog today revealed a
Sprightly red robin.
|
Today I heard the
Ice crack; brief respite from the
Old suicide song.
|
And all shall be
well
And all manner of things shall be
Well:
Mission statement?
|
No rumination;
No
self-criticism; no
Dark sarcasm; no..
|
There is no pain
you
Are receding, distant ship
Smoke on the hori....
|
Have compassion for
Yourself; then you will have it
For all living
things.
|
Yours
is a caring
Love: a list-making, menu-
Wise, sheet-changing love.
|
Am I emerging
From the hardest, coldest most
Prolonged of winters? |
Get the bike out of
The shed; check tyres; get on;
Follow the pedals.
|
In today's mud, I
Found a plastic butterfly:
Wings open in flight. |
And today we have
Neuroplasticity; the
Old brain fighting back.
|
There is no pain in
The present: there
is no pain
In the present ...there... |
We're stayin'
alive,
Stayin' alive...Ah, ha,
Ha, ha, stayin'
a......
|
Even the thickest,
Most pernicious fog must lift
Eventually.
|
When
depression strikes
Find whatever raft you can
And hold
on tightly.
|
Step out of your
head
And see the raging, ragged
Glory of the world.
|
Nobody
taught me
How to soothe myself - so: soothe
Me
baby, soothe me.
|
Scrooge-like
conversion:
Christmas warmth and goodwill:
A new
sensation. |
Like
Devil's Snare you
Need to relax - or it will
Certainly
kill you.
|
Watch Alex Hennold
Climbing in Yosemite;
Absorb the same fear. |
Re-engagement with
Normal conversation:
Humdrum and
special.
|
Flex the brain's
muscle:
Car number plates; sums or the
Alphabet
backwards.
|
Life is
a taxing
5.15 pitch with only
Pinches and slopers.
|
I am
retrieving
Data that was lost when my
Hard-drive was
wiped clean. |
The
brain is just a
Clever abacus - so don't
Use it to
think with.
|
The secret of life
Is to transmutate your base
Metal into gold. |
Speak
to everyone:
Listen to everyone: share
The precious
moment.
|
Where are the
songs of
Spring? Ah, where are they? Coming
Maybe...yes....coming. |
Spring sunlight warming
My old bones: glimpse of
something
Starting to happen? |
Today I accept
The solitary magpie
As an ill omen. |
If
you can accept
The unacceptable - you
Are close to
the way.
|
Defrag memory:
Dust it, de-rust it; drive out
Fog and then reboot. |
How
many times must
I stare into the abyss
Before stepping
back? |
Spring is needed
more
Than ever now to wrestle
Winter's iron grip. |
Soothing in-breath and
Soothing out-breath; steady down
The raging tempest.
|
Reset the brain to
Factory setting: save new
Photos and contacts. |
My illness is not
Me: but my illness makes it
Seem
like it is me.
|
Depression is a
Deception - but a very
Subtle deception. |
Depression takes you
Over and manipulates
Your
thoughts - secretly. |
It wants you to
think
That what you think is real
But it's not real. |
It uses all the
Bad feelings that you have stored
Up
through your whole life. |
It is like ivy
Growing round your dark heart and
Constricting you. |
It is pernicious
And will not cease; it wants your
Corpse - nothing less. |
You are not me; be
Gone. Leave my body now; I
Command you to go. |
The more closely you
Identify with it - the
Tighter
it grips you.
|
It takes you over:
You speak black words and you
Only think black thoughts. |
You are a trickster:
Conning me with my own thoughts;
Misleading my eyes.
|
Who put the scales
on
My eyes? Who put the ice in
My heart? Why, you did. |
It is the hardest
Puzzle, the trickiest mind
Game. Can
you beat it? |
You are a vampire
You tap into my veins: you
Feast on my bad blood. |
You and your old pal
Anxiety hooked into
Me three
years ago.
|
Like the ill-fated
Odysseus - I am on
An epic journey. |
Let go: surrender;
Accept; don't fight; submit: but
Don't capitulate.
|
Cut the ivy stem,
Unpick the bindweed; drive out
The evil black fog. |
See it for what it
Is: sucker fish, leech, clingon:
Serious downer.
|
Separate yourself
From its sticky tendrils; learn
To name and shame it. |
Jesus only spent
Forty days and forty nights
In the
wilderness.
|
Resurrection man:
Roll away your stone: step out
Showing stigmata. |
For Christians Easter;
For Pagans spring; for me hope
Of any slight change.
|
Don't be defined
by
It: be bigger than it - this
Mother of all doom. |
Relax into the
Chamomile tea: the yellow
Scented
infusion.
|
Today I brought
home
A tulip tree: to plant now
And to be here for. |
I came back to life
At Woodspring Priory - where
The
ravens circle. |
Old friends; old
humour;
Old music; old ale; old house;
Glimpse of an
old me. |
Glacial - almost
Imperceptible change - but
Change
nonetheless. Ha. |
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The Bad.....
|
|
I gather the yew
And the foxglove - ready for
A
gardener's death.
|
The oblivion
Of sleep is followed by the
Horror
of waking.
|
Under gravity
My star collapsed
- transforming
Into a black hole.
|
The mind cannot work
Out the problem - because the
Mind is the problem.
|
Here they come again
The black thoughts -
congregating
Like rooks and jackdaws.
|
Always happiest
Inside my head; but now
locked
In with no way out.
|
3 am on the
Ward: torchlight through the glass to
Check I'm still alive.
|
Constant dizziness:
The pavement
moving like a
Boat underneath me.
|
What happened to my
Swift, ingenious, agile
Mind?
The fog got in.
|
Your self esteem is
Under a rock; lift
it and
Watch it slither off.
|
I am the undead;
Earthbound staggerer - lurching
One step at a time.
|
Indescribable
Hell: seconds, minutes,
hours, days
Weeks and months and years.
|
Limber up; focus;
Concentrate; attempt
now to
Tie your shoelaces.
|
The keyboard resists
Me - its dizzy
lexicon
Bemusing the brain.
|
Your thoughts are not true
But they seem
true: so innate
And perfectly formed.
|
Recrimination
And guilt grow like black
flowers:
Profuse; invasive.
|
You are unworthy
And you deserve
to suffer.
Self-evident truths?
|
Throughout your
lifetime -
You gradually became
More and
more helpless.
|
The fog entered the
Pores of my skin,
my blood cells,
My cerebellum.
|
My anxiety
Is a nuclear explosion
With the sound turned down.
|
Indecision,
Clumsiness and
weariness
Pervade every task.
|
Objects have become
Awkward and unwieldy
- with
A mind of their own.
|
I lost interest
In everything: music and
Words
and photographs.
|
My voice grew less and
Less: the
strangled utterance
Of a non-person. |
At home I become
A cipher: tea-boy, taxi
Driver,
butt of jokes.
|
Not being able
To recognise progress is
Part of the illness. |
Outwardly I am
Doing things; inwardly I
Am the dead man walking.
|
Writing was escape;
Distraction;
avoidance; drug;
Denial; false dream. |
My gyroscope is
Out of
kilter; I snag and
Trip and bump and catch.
|
Each day the eagle
Rips out my liver; each day
My liver regrows. |
I am Sisyphus:
Stone-roller;
labourer: locked
For eternity.
|
Is pain a portal?
Will suffering lead to the
Unmanifested? |
Or is pain just pain?
Suffering just suffering?
Life a living hell?
|
Accentuate the
Positive; eliminate
The negative...er... |
Get out of your mind
Quickly -
or you will quickly
Go out of your mind.
|
All my life I have
Resisted the sea: but the
Sea always breaks through.
|
My illness opened
A window on
a million
Hidden shortcomings.
|
Self-absorbed;
selfish;
Anti-social; unhelpful;
But not malicious.
|
You were the adult -
The bill
payer; I was the
Idiot savant.
|
I had to relearn
How to read and write - how to
Make a cup of tea.
|
In the whispering
Bamboo forests of Felthorpe
I sat down and wept.
|
Like Neo I was
Plugged into an unreal,
Simulated world. |
Relaxation is
Impossible now; just the
Ever present hell.
|
The calendar has
No
meaning now: just numbers:
Blurred; forgettable. |
Endless
prescriptions;
Endless tablets; endlessly
Searching
for relief.
|
These final
scratchings:
Tale told by an idiot?
Or mad
masterpiece? |
What legacy for
My beautiful daughters? Mad
Dad or mad dead dad?
|
Each day a lifetime:
The tortuous tape loop with
Its incessant voice. |
Was it really just
Hearing impairment? Or did
I stop listening?
|
Some enlightenment
Through suffering, sure; but a
Little late for me. |
Time terrifies me
Now: a driverless train:
Locked; unstoppable.
|
My real life was
You, Tom, the girls; instead I
Fucked around with art. |
Intolerable
Anguish: intolerable choice:
Intolerable.
|
You were my Sad-Eyed
Lady of the Lowlands, my
Shelter from the Storm. |
My identity
Has
always been pain: the Man
Of Constant Sorrow.
|
Disidentify
With
pain; surrender to it;
Stop hurting yourself. |
The pain-body
needs
Pain; it creates it; it feeds
On it; it wants
it.
|
Pain is locked into
The tumbling double helix
Of my DNA.
|
Hard-wired
suffering;
The need to punish myself;
But for what
offence?
|
Could I live without
Pain? My raison d'etre - ah,
That is the question. |
Was it nature or
Nurture? Destiny? Or just
Old-fashioned bad luck?
|
'We cannot get
out....
The end comes. Drums, drums in the
Deep....they are coming.' |
How long can you
keep
Out the thoughts? A second? Ten
Seconds? A
minute?
|
The remnants of a
Previous life: camera:
Shell Guide to Norfolk. |
Root-ball laurel;
yew;
Box; photinia: remnants
Of a present life.
|
Each day the battle
For sanity and balance;
Each day the defeat. |
The brain
is fog-bound
Now: stumbles, lumbers; cannot
Get back
to the path.
|
Two and a half years
Into my afterlife and
I still long for death. |
Mending a puncture
Is now rocket science; the
Patches perplexing.
|
No capacity
For
making good memories
Only murky ones. |
How did
I get such
A very low opinion
Of myself mother?
|
When I was alive
I
loved the unforthcoming
Landscape of Norfolk. |
The
impossible
Conundrum: hell for me or
For my family.
|
My every third
thought
Shall be my grave: indeed or,
For me,
every thought. |
Shed.
Once a bastion
Of orderliness; now I
Can't find
anything.
|
Each day the brain
tries
To solve the problem; and each
Day it fails big
time. |
The
compass in my
Head has broken; so I am
Mad
north-by-north-west.
|
My old 'Spidey sense'
Has gone now - leaving a veiled,
Intermittent pulse. |
New
barometer
Required for small changes
In the bad
weather.
|
Nothing feels OK
Anymore: people, places
Things: all alien. |
I
have of late - but
Wherefore I know not - lost all
My
mirth (No kidding).
|
OK to be not
OK? Or
not OK to
Be not OK? Hmmm. |
All my
beautiful
Norfolk horizons shrunk to
A blank window
box.
|
I blocked out life and
Death for as long as I could;
Then they both rushed in. |
I
sleepwalked through life
Missing all the wake-up calls
Till the nightmare came.
|
Once Nevis, Scafell
And Snowdon: now I stagger
To the local shop. |
No one
is to blame:
Just an unfortunate set
Of circumstances.
|
Writing used to be
My Patronus charm; keeping
Out the Dementors. |
Soon
the time will come
When I need to decide to
Put up
or shut up.
|
We saw something in
Each other but what was it?
Love? Need? Tragedy? |
A
meticulous
Haiku chain; weighed syllables;
Long
suicide note.
|
I trudge through the
sludge
In my very own Gulag
Archipelago. |
In a
parallel
Universe - there is a bright
Happy Cameron.
|
Calories enter
My
system and the flatline
Rises up a nadge. |
Home
was always my
Sanctuary, my study -
But now my gaol.
|
Whenever I go
Out -
I feel like Captain Oats:
And may be some time. |
Been
over it a
Million million times: and it's
Still
impossible.
|
Still struggling to
type:
Hand-eye coordination
And brain all skew-whiff. |
Mum was
a tightly
Wound ball of anxiety,
Anger and darkness.
|
Dad was a good guy -
Apart from his affair - which
Crippled him with guilt. |
I am a
bully
To myself: unforgiving;
Relentless; cruel.
|
I was a master
Of
resistance - but the Borg
Were right all along. |
Anhedonia
Is the life for me - the dark,
Bleak
monotony.
|
Can I write my way
Out of this hole: or should I
Simply stop digging? |
Some depressives can't
Get out of their bed; I can't
Get out of my head.
|
Oh, I wish I'd looked
After my brain and spotted
The dangers of drain.
|
Not a desire to
Die - but a desire not to
Keep
living like this.
|
Two hundred times a
Day I think of dying; and
Two times of living. |
How did he lose both
Sylvia and Assia? How?
Now I
understand.
|
What can I say that
Isn't apology or,
At worst, a farewell? |
The only way now
Is the Way of the Cross;
The suffering way.
|
I always lived on
A cliff edge: narrow footholds:
A long way to fall. |
I awoke in the
Deep my
own Balrog: a dark
Malignant monster.
|
Our conversation
Is
perfunctory: dogs and
Food, dogs and food, dogs...
|
The word 'suicide'
Leaps out from pages - even
When it isn't there.
|
Black thoughts are coming
Quickly now: not single spies
But in batallions.
|
Ultimately, no
Words to express the hopeless,
Desperate despair.
|
Spatial distortion;
Brain-fog; memory loss; black
Thought-storm; dizziness. |
No relief from the
Thought-storm: just unrelenting
Wind and hail and rain.
|
No capacity
For
rewarding myself; no
Congratulations.
|
The landscape of my
Childhood was a frozen one;
With
soil like iron.
|
For years I trawled
The I Ching and the Tarot
For
reassurance. |
My body has been
On terror alert for three
Years;
taut; traumatised.
|
Andrenalin and
Cortisol flood my system:
Flight or fight or freeze.
|
My amygdala
Has been firing for three years:
Dark,
primitive fears.
|
It is not your fault;
It is not my fault and it
Is not the girls' fault. |
In the end, what can
I say? Maybe: So long and
Thanks for all the
fish.
|
If this were a climb
I would name it 'Inferno'
And grade it E10. |
Regrettably it
Is the truth: always winter
But
never Christmas.
|
What can I give you?
Only my damaged presence
For another day. |
I only have two
Choices: both utterly
Unacceptable.
|
Exit interview
Complete; do not return to
Desk; leave the building. |
Pain unbearable
Now: relentless; unrelieved;
Searing.
Help me God.
|
Tired; hopeless;
dizzy;
Tormented and suffering:
Longing for peace now. |
Black dog in the bones;
Black dog in the synapses;
Black dog in the soul.
|
Half-dead-stumbler:
brain
Misfiring; senses askew;
Daily tasks harder.
|
If I was a dog
They would put me down - citing
Quality
of life.
|
Forgetful; challenged;
Anhedonic; tortured: sunk;
Entering endgame.
|
The dreadful grinding
Slow wheel of time: tomorrow
and
Tomorrow and...
|
I was always in
A
hurry to get things done -
Escaping the now. |
I have endured this
Unimaginable hell
For three years
now. And...?
|
Can I get out of
Here with any dignity
In tact? Uncertain. |
We are rats in a
Sack: biting and clawing and
Hurting
in the dark.
|
What previously
Sustained me has gone now: words
And occupation. |
How will I get through
Another day? Suffering
And
struggling is how. |
Sorbus and prunus
Are in bud now; but I might
Not see the new leaves.
|
Leaden-limbed, brain-fogged
Lummox: moribund, morbid-
Mouthing mannikin.
|
My only pleasure
Is
the Ambrosia Rice
Pudding sugar rush. |
Black dog fits over
Your head like a caul, like a
Tight hood, like a noose.
|
I am made of lead
Now: lead bones, lead flesh, lead skin:
Moving is so
hard.
|
My brain is over-
Thrown now and my poor, weary
Body
shutting down.
|
The earth's gravity
Has increased - pinning me to
The floor, crushing me.
|
Just pain now: that old
Twisting, turning - unending
Knife-through-the-heart-pain.
|
24/7
365:
fucked. Suck it up
Or top yourself quick. |
Learned helplessness was
Disguised as art: they fueled each Other
and felled me.
|
Like bindweed in
the
Old hedge - it curled and twisted
Round me so
tightly. |
Nothing (it seems) will
Bring back my balance or my
Spatial awareness.
|
I stopped buying
clothes.
What use has a dead man with
Shirts and pants
and socks? |
Everything is just
Restatement now: let the words
Subside: slip away.
|
|
...and the Mindful
|
All day long the smoke
From the fire pit drifted up
Over the forest.
|
Chop vegetables;
Wash dishes; look out at the
Golden autumn leaves. |
If you can't change it -
Accept it;
embrace it; then
Surrender to it.
|
Today, satori
Seems as far off as ever:
Ungraspable ghost.
|
Through the nursery
Mud - the wobbly wheel of the
Sack-barrow squeaks,
squeaks...
|
Listen, feel, touch, smell,
See the present; allow it
To be manifest. |
In the bowl are
the
Yellow bananas: bunched; curved
Immovably here.
|
Look at the bamboo
Leaf: its delicate finger
Coming to a point. |
Sometimes dear appear -
Alert under the pine trees:
Watching me pot-up.
|
Blustery wind
shakes
The bamboo stems; agitates
The pointed
leaf-tips.
|
Cleared the snow from the
Path today revealing the
Old chequerboard
tiles.
|
Robin
singing in
The willow tree today. Can
It sense
spring coming? |
December sunlight:
Planting out liquid amber
Whips in the far field. |
Dogwood and
dog-rose;
Blackthorn and buckthorn; hazel
And liquid
amber. |
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by Norfolk Tourism