Where Does It Come From?

Last night he spent awhile sleeping next to me

waking me with jerking limbs

and fear in his voice

more than once

dreaming

What did you dream?

I asked in the morning

One hundred monsters

one hundred tornadoes

one hundred hurricanes...

.....

A young woman with

too many kids

and not enough help

calls the crisis line

routinely at midnight

in a panic:

hyperventilating,

tightness in her chest,

dread without a source,

certain she's going to die

Where does anxiety come from?

and you search the darkness for an answer

to give her that might help

and say something like

it's depression's twin

which doesn't help

and only gives her another illness

to worry about

you want to tell her

anxiety comes from believing 

that you are just too small

to handle the enormity

of all that you are dealing with

combined with all that's still to come

instead you tell her to exhale fully

and take a big, slow breath

slowly out

slowly in

slow your breathing down

and your heart will slow down too

focus only on the next breath

just the next step

she says thank you and hangs up

and then in the darkness

you find sleep has slipped

out of the room

and you try to focus on

breathing the next one

slowly