development of eunoia

Peter Dean Rickards

it’s been 9 years since i wrote this. i was experiencing 24/7 anxiety so badly that i needed serious medication. these days in the back of my car is an “emergency party box.” when people admit they no longer really celebrate their birthday; i tell them to put the sash on and queue up kesha, we’re going bowling or something. these days i can’t spin around without finding something i am enamored with. these days i list 3 things i’m grateful for before i fall asleep. you’re probably one of them, just by virtue of you existing.

at the time i wrote this, i was suffering through a severe panic attack literally every night. i tortured my brother with constant 2 AM calls just to hear someone else breathing, because i couldn’t be alone in the silence.

i rarely wish i was still 23 even though ironically i had more hope back then. what i can tell you is this: i love the same way, but bigger now. i’ve worn the velvet cape to several business meetings. i spent thursday in a crop top without caring what my stomach looked like.

i told her i like her; i often dress as a witch. i still got glass in my foot this morning. i’ve kissed maybe a thousand people since then and met a million more than that; passing like the shadow of a hammerhead in trains and planes and buses.

i saw you, beloved, there, maybe, on platform in south station. you didn’t speak, but you said: i struggle to give the nothing meaning. the nothing fills up everything. it is just loud and yellowed panicked silence. i can’t stop shaking.

on the roof, birds curl together against the chilled spring wind. the sky outside of the craft store was an iridescent pink. the nothing already had meaning; you are giving it meaning by witnessing.