The Blame Game

My anxiety grips
the calendar and shakes out carnations
as it screams May Day, May Day.

It fills the days with swollen feet festivities
and family dinner silences.
My apprehension sends me an anniversary card

on the twelfth to remind me of my ex,
and how he moved out without a phone call,
but left a receiver and a list of bills.

Mother toned you could have done better
and I am so disappointed echoes, until I am knot throated
in weight comparisons and unmet expectations.

May swaddles my rapid pulse close
and rocks it to sleep
with tremor and frantic breath lullabies,

and I spend the year counting down
to shame and doubt filled May.
My depression finds me in the basement

organizing stockpiles of canned tears and pickled shivers,
and it pries my holy calendar from my hands.
It flips the pages until my cowering shadow

bends and shifts in a slow motion cartoon
moving from month to month
until I am left in a knotted mess of sheets,

missed calls and black out curtains.
My sob soaked shirt sleeves and waterlogged fingers pull
out the photo albums of back to school moments,

summer vacations, and snowball fights
to find panic pinned
in the corners of each image.

Amanda Hawk lives in Seattle between the roaring planes and concrete jungle. She splits her time with her son and friends, and the city’s neon lights. She has been published in Volney Road Review, Drunk Monkeys Literary Journal, Eye to the Telescope and the winnow magazine. Currently, she is one of six Puget Sound writers to have their work featured in City of Edmond's Poet's Perspective for 2023.