ANXIETY
by 
Gwen Austin
Copyright 2001

Wearing a puce-gray wool shawl
anxiety dines on dry crackers, turnips and weak tea
before prowling dark corridors
of what-might-have-beens 
and negative what-ifs

Anxiety sleeps at a fitful pace
filled with 'sleep-starts'
void of REMs

Intoning "probably something bad will happen"
anxiety starts one thing
abandoning it for another

Unfanned sparks of hope
dwindle and die.

Anxiety binds its spirit inmate
 in a straitjacket
self-created strands
of nebulous negative niggles