Collapse

A poem about panic attacks

First the heat wave hits
As if someone threw a blanket
Fresh out of the dryer over me
Then invisible needles begin to impale me
I'm locked in an iron maiden
And as I buckle in pain, I feel the eyes
Lock onto me
Suddenly everyone knows I don't belong
The moisture leaves my mouth
And saturates my skin
Stains beneath my arms grow
By now my muscles are as ridged as
A Medusa victim
My large clumsy hands tremor
Like a geriatric
At this point I'm center stage
With all spotlights on me
My boiling blood has all risen to my face
And I glow like a fire engine
Even with these glasses
The world around me blurs
And separates
English becomes a foreign language
As I stare at the words as hard as I can
But my mind declines them like a wrinkled dollar
The world goes silent and all I hear
Are the explosive sounds of my body
The sprinting heart exploding
The shallow breaths my lungs struggle for
The ringing in my ears like the highest note of
Ten piccolos
I know everyone else must be able to hear it too
They must know how I'm crumbling
Like left out bread
I feel as though I will start crying any second
Like there are hundreds of short circuits
In my body
The air around me is crushing my body
As if it were an ocean
Still the mantra going on and on
In my head
They know, they know, they know, they know

Author's Note

I hate the title, but it was all I could come up with for now.