by Susan Robinson
Image credit: Lauren Kay, via Unsplash
The elephants stampeded around in my head.
Great big grey lumps of worry and dread,
they crashed through my thoughts,
crushing hopes and dreams under large feet.
Rational thought stood no chance against the elephants,
which multiplied, a herd of hundreds,
taking up all the space in my brain,
leaving no room for sunshine or air to breathe.
The elephants were heavy,
they weighed me down,
made my limbs like lead,
so hard to move.
The elephants were in me, were part of me,
yet they consumed me.
Stabbing me with tusks of worry,
sharp pain shooting through me.
They harrumphed and sighed, would not be silenced.
Big and loud, impossible to ignore,
the worried elephants were my constant companions,
wild and untamed, roaming free.
Slowly I learned to build and tend
fences of self care to contain and pen
the worried elephants
They are still there
They never forget
But I can try and tame and befriend
live peacefully alongside
Be their keeper,
Rather than them being mine
Susan Robinson
Susan enjoys creative writing and used to run a writing group in Edinburgh for women with lived experience of mental health issues, who exhibited their writing in the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival (SMHAF). Susan now runs a writing group at the Ripple Project and has co-written and co-starred in a number of plays in Leith Festival, as well as having stories shortlisted in competitions run by the Health and Social Care Academy and SMHAF. Susan wants to help reduce the stigma around mental health.
