I do it, but it absolutely ruins all my nerves

Just got home from a poetry read that I performed with a fellow poet. It was a verse for verse style. So I read a poem, he read a poem.

I could hardly look up between my poems. My neck was so tight with nerves it rattled from anxiety, I felt I was on the edge of a seizure. My lord! Why do I do these things to myself? I could hide in a hole and never emerge and never have to deal with those feelings but I walk into them, I stride head on to.

Although, I did rabbit out of there pretty quick after reading my poems.

Here’s one I wrote just for the occasion!

This poem is called The Red Phone

Excuse me a moment while I try calming myself

Vibrationally shot nerves are hard to soothe- once felt

Im a writer recluse you see, not much of a public speaker

And pre-apologies, but I once read that poetry without rhyme aient much of a keeper

But I tell ya, this heart thrashing is deafening my ears

Performance anxiety, social anxiety, god damn generalized anxiety

Amplifying my millions of irrational fears

Because truly a writers place is with an ink pen and pad of paper

Absolutely nothing would make me, any bit the happier

Although sometimes, imagination has its disadvantage

Train my brain to seek a disastrous end-age

I wrote a poem once, called The Red Phone

Too dark, I suppose, so it never found its tone

But here’s a quick rendition

Because freedom from the blackhole is its mission

The red phone

I blink and imagine im in a sky-high high rise

Chaos flutters about, threatening to crash into demise

The office stinks of depression, nothing to pass the time

Stress sweat drowning, yet i sit here situationally fine

The emergency phone rings

The red phone, it shouts- ‘drama’ it sings

A car accident

An explosion

A death

A bridge gave way

It doesn’t matter the scenario, it’s the same each day

A bloody end to a loved shows in my mind like an unsoliciated play

The red phone rings and I scream and I cry

Because worry is the life of a mother

And fear is the practice of a writer

Ive trained my mind to stretch to the furthest limit

To find the impossible – possibilities that hide within it

But I reel myself in, and I remind my panic laced – heart rate -arryhthmia race

That Cortisol high will come down, calm down, relax, I will survive

show my children that strength is practiced, it starts as a lie

I turn my pain and fear into poetry and prose

Because sometimes I’m lucky, and get to share the words – I wrote

-Norma Rrae

This card I’m holding is from my Ekphrastic poetry win, see my poems page to read ‘Beads and Beards’

Til next public speaking event,

Stay calm my friends,

Norma Rrae