The Hamlet Project

Grief
Despair
Anxiety
Consternation
Just because we’ve all felt them
Doesn’t make them any less acute.
Every grief is the first grief.
Every anxious moment feels like it takes over the world
Like a black cloud spreading out over the sun
Shading the earth
Filling the sky.
No matter how much we tell ourselves the sky is blue
Under this layer of vapor
Or that the sun is fiercely bright
Behind this veil of dark –
The shadows stretch farther and wider
Edging past our feeble reassurances
Pushing the boundaries
Til all we know is that dark world.
If you tell me
You see the darkness too
Or that you have once watched it spread
Like oil over water
You may poke a hole for light to stream through
Yes
But if you tell me
That it’s no big deal
That this ink
Is just like breath
A digestion
A fact of life
Like any other
I will shape my darkness into a rope and I will be
Tempted to wrap it around your neck
Until you see my shadows clearly.